


It's All Just Temporary

by GreyWithAnE



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, And it's pretty much only dialogue, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Asexual Character, Asexual Relationship, Ash Lynx Needs A Hug, Ash Lynx needs a therapist, Ash is 16, Btw it’s rated teen and up because I may or may not be a teen, Child Abuse, Dino basically 'fosters' children, Dino had a heart attack, Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, Everybody hates Dino, Except he doesn't, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Graduation, Griffin Does Not, Hurt/Comfort, I don’t write that stuff, I promise, I suck at writing dialogue, I'm Bad At Tagging, If there is then i'll warn beforehand, It's all trash, M/M, Max is like 'I dont know you but your related to my dead best friend so im gonna take you in', My soul is always with you, No Smut, No more tags now, Not too much, Nothing worse that what happens in the show, Oh yea forgot a few things, Oop, Or Is It?, Pining Ash Lynx, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Ash Lynx, Self-Acceptance, Sexual Abuse, Shorter Wong Lives, Slow Burn, So I got him one, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Therapy, Yea so like, adoption AU I guess???, all aboard the emotional distress express!, asking for a friend, but like, cause pretty much everything is different?, feeling cute might delete later, how many tags is too many?, like they should, literally a first draft so go easy on me, my finger slipped and oops there’s angst now, no beta we die like Ash, ok, please just read it, so Ash is in need of 'temporary' relocation, so jokes on me!, spoilers to the anime I guess??, this is going to be trash, you have to search for it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:27:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 16
Words: 44,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27803782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreyWithAnE/pseuds/GreyWithAnE
Summary: Ash has been sitting in the same stupid chair for about five hours now. His phone ran out of battery on hour two, and even then, there isn't much to do without wifi but sit and play an updated version of the old snake game. The chair is cheap and stiff, and makes his butt hurt like hell. He wants to get up and stretch, but he isn’t in the mood to draw attention to himself, because he knows. He knows as soon as his butt leaves that musty fabric Mrs. CPS-worker is gonna be on him, asking if he wants anything.And oh boy does Ash know what he wants above all else:Dino to die from his (not-so) out of the blue heart attack,Griffin to miraculously live again,and a house out in the middle of nowhere where he could live without a care in the world.Except none of these things are ever going to happen, because he's Ash Lynx; prostitute, murderer, and an absolutely worthless nobody.In come Max and Jessica, who have already signed the adoption papers.
Relationships: Ash Lynx & Jessica Randy, Ash Lynx & Michael, Ash Lynx & Nadia Wong, Ash Lynx & Okumura Eiji, Ash Lynx & Shorter Wong, Ash Lynx/Okumura Eiji, Dino Golzine/Jessica's Shotgun, Max Lobo & Ash Lynx, Max Lobo/Jessica Randy
Comments: 373
Kudos: 328





	1. "Who the hell is calling at this hour?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just wanted to say, that all of the chapters in this are gonna contain little moments with Ash’s thoughts that can sometimes be kinda graphic. Just wanted to say this right now, for anybody who is not comfortable with that, that this might not be the fic for you. Because this fic WILL be going over some touchy things. 
> 
> Now that this has been said, you know what you are getting into. I will of course warn when there will be much darker stuff happening, and I will, of course, leave a note at the end of the chapter basically explaining what happened for people who want to skip over that material. (Also wanted to note that I will not be writing rape graphically, and that it is not something I ever intend to do, so you don’t have to worry about that.) 
> 
> So moving on, hope you enjoy. :)
> 
> -
> 
> Max Interlude I
> 
> -

The phone rang sometime between 3:00 AM and 5:00 AM, Max woke with a groggy and unhappy: “Who the hell is calling at this hour?”

Jessica lifts her head up for a moment before her eyes shut, she hums in response. “I dunno maybe somebody died…” she plops her head face first into the pillow, pushing it into her ears. 

“Somebody better have, or I’m killing whoever called…” Max mumbles to himself. 

“Ditto. Now be quiet and get the phone before my head implodes.”

Max relents, and exposes himself to the cold air beyond the incredibly comfortable duvet. He’s still grumbling as he swipes the phone from the dresser, he steps out of the bedroom into the hall before answering it, “who is it?” he snaps. 

“Umm, hello? I was wondering if—?”

“Who’s calling?!” Jessica yells from the other room. 

“I’m trying to figure that out!” He yells back, shielding the caller from the noise by pushing his hand over the bottom of the telephone. “I’m sorry.” He starts, “can you repeat that?”

“Right. Umm, I was wondering if I called the right number. Is this Max Glenreed?.”

“H—” He pauses, “—How do you know that name?” Max demands. 

“I— it was written as an emergency contact for ‘Griffin Callenreese’... Now I’m assuming by your reaction that you are Mr. Glenreed?”

“It's Lobo now actually.”

“Oh, oh yes. Sorry it says it right here on your file.”

“My file…? What are you talking about? Why are you calling me about Griffin? He died. Seven and a half years ago if i’m correct. Why are you bringing this up now?”

“I’m… not sure if you are informed about this… but Griffin has a younger brother.”

“Yeah… uh, his name was Aslan right?”

“Right. Now Mr. Lobo—”

“Max.” he interrupts.

“Sorry—  _ Max _ … see, my name is Synthia Jones, I’m a case worker with CPS.”

“CPS…? We only signed up last month. I'm surprised you’re getting back to us this soon. Sorry I’m probably making a horrible impression but—? Doesn’t a process like this usually take years?”

“Around four months actually… but this is a  _ special _ situation.”

“Special how?”

“Aslan Callenreese…” she pauses, probably for dramatic effect, “we need you to take him in.”

“What? Now?”

“Yes. I mean— it’ll only be for a week or so. Probably even less. But we’re really tied up over here and we need you to come get him tonight. If that’s alright with you?”

“Of course! ...Do— do you want me to drive over there now?”

“No. Sorry— wrong choice of words. I’ll be driving him to your house. You still have the same address as on the paperwork you filled out last month?”

“I should.”

“Okay. You have a spare bedroom, correct?”

“Of course, umm, we had to just in case anyone ever called. I mean, why would we sign up for this if we didn’t have one?... Jessica and me didn’t think this would be happening so soon, good thing we thought to renovate that guest bedroom as early as we did,” he chuckles quietly to himself, “I mean— sorry I’m rambling…” he sighs, “I’m just a little nervous.”

“That’s totally fine, you wouldn't imagine the horror stories I have from a job like this.” she sighs, half laughing, “a little bit of rambling was never the worst of anybody’s problems.”

“Ok, I guess I’ll just wait downstairs to open the door for you. Ooh, and I should probably double check to make sure the bedroom is ready while I’m at it. How long of a drive is it?”

“Around twenty minutes.”

“Okay then, everything should be ready for him when you get here. Guess I’ll see you in twenty.”

“See you then. And Max?” 

“Yes?”

“I can’t stress this enough. Thank you so much. You're really helping us out here.”

“It’s honestly no problem. This is what I signed up for isn’t it?”

“I guess it is.” She chuckles slightly. “We’ll see you soon.”

“Okay. Bye.”

“Bye.”

He isn’t sure who hangs up first. But he’s already dashing back to the bedroom rushing to put clothes on. (He’s not naked, but he isn’t entirely dressed either.) 

“Who was it?”

“CPS.” He states as he struggles to find a decent pair of pants in the dark. 

“CPS?” Jessica sits up, seemingly more awake. She tugs at the lamp string to her right. Illuminating the dark room ever so slightly. “But it’s only been a month!”

“That’s what I said!”

“Did they find a match?”

“I don’t know if that’s the right way to put it. But yes. You remember Griff?”

“Griff as in Griffin Callenreese?” she asks, pushing the blanket off of her legs. “From Iraq?”

“That’s the one.” He says, finally getting his second leg into the pants hole.

“What?... did he have an illegitimate love child or something?” she says, not entirely joking. 

“Not entirely too far off…” he pauses to put a new shirt on. “His younger brother.”

“Brother? But Griffin would’ve been in his late twenties by now, maybe even thirties. Wouldn't that mean his brother is over eighteen at this point?” Jessica is already up, taking the cue to get dressed. 

“I remember Griffin saying that they had different mothers. Something around a fifteen year age gap.”

“Fifteen years?” She asks, grabbing the hairbrush from her nightstand. “So that makes his brother anywhere from twelve to seventeen? Right?”

“I— guess. I dunno it’s been so long since I’ve heard about him. I guess I just assumed he’d still be a toddler.”

“Max? Are we even equipped to handle a teenager?”

“I— I dunno. But I already said yes and—“

“You already said yes? Without talking to me?”

“Well I mean I couldn’t exactly say no…?” He says sheepishly. “I mean, what do you expect? that they’ll ask me to take in this poor kid without a home, the brother to my dead friend, and I’ll just say ‘yeah now’s not exactly the right time.’”

She sighs audibly. “Yes. Your right. I know. I’m sorry. I’m just worried.”

“No I’m sorry.” He pauses. “And there’s no need to be worried… We’re doing good with Michael, right? How’s a teenager all that different? And plus, we only need to watch him for a week or so. We do have an extra bed. It’s the least we can do to let him stay here.”

She sighs. “If you say so.”

“I know so.” he kisses her on the forehead. “I’m going to go make sure the bedroom is all ready for when he gets here.”

“I’ll join you in a moment.”

“Okay.” He goes to leave the room. He stops at the last second. “Jessica?”

“Yeah?” She looks up at him. Eyebrows raised. 

“I love you.” He says, smiling. She tilts her head to the side and smiles back. 

“I love you too.”

  
  


...

  
  


He’s got the room all ready, and there’s still (supposedly) five minutes before Aslan shows up. Jessica came down five minutes earlier, looking like she’s been up for hours. They’re both sitting there, acting like a bunch of meth addicts without a fix. He needs to calm down. To remind himself that the last thing they need to do is stress out the kid. But it’s his best friend's brother. His best friend who died seven years ago, in his own arms, brother. It’s the m̶a̶n̶ child, the myth, the legend. Aslan Callenreese. 

It’s been twenty-three minutes and a half (not that he’s counted) when the doorbell rings. It startles him, but he rushes to the door. Wiping his hand on his pants. Jessica’s there beside him, it reassures him a bit. Knowing that he’s not the only clueless mess here. He opens the door. Smiling as best he can, hoping his nerves don’t show through. 

He’s met with a round face, she looks stressed. (If the worry lines around her eyes were anything to go by.) She’s probably in her forties, very dark brown (black maybe?) hair tied back in either a ponytail or a bun, he can’t see behind her so he isn’t sure. What he can see is that she’s dressed well, (or trying to) a (presumably cheap) suit and skirt wrapped around her. She extends her hand, “Hi, I’m Synthia Jones. We talked on the phone.”

“Yes! I’m Max, as you know, and this is Jessica, my wife.”

“Good to meet you Mrs. Lobo.” 

“It’s Mrs. Randy... but that’s hardly important.” She waves her hand, changing the topic. “Now… about Aslan. Is he here with you?”

“Yes. He’s just in the car actually.” She points to behind her. “Is there anything you need to ask before I bring him in?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Ok. I’ll go get him. Oh and don’t worry about not knowing what to do, I’ll go over all the basics before I go. I just think it’d be better if I didn’t leave him in the car this whole time.”

“Oh okay.”

The door stays open, watching as she disappears around the house, they hear the clicking of her high heels against the pavement. A moment later they can hear a car door opening, more footsteps and it closes again. She appears around the corner again. Max catches some golden blonde behind her, almost the same colour as Jessica’s. 

“This,” Synthia starts once she’s back in front of them, now stepping to the side. “Is Aslan.” He’s different then Max would have pictured him. Of course he is. Max was picturing a six year old. This boy though, is so much older. Seven years since Griff died? He finally does the math in his head. That would make the boy in front of him around sixteen years old. He looks it too. He’s tall (not as tall as him, Max’s ego wouldn’t have been able to take that), but compared to proportions the boy looks that much taller. He’s as skinny as a noodle, looks like a strong wind could blow him over. Okay, that was an over exaggeration, the kid looks like any other nerdy teenage boy. He’s a skinny beanpole. Although nerdy wasn’t the right way to put it. He looked, he doesn’t know how to describe it other than almost like a girl. But like— also obviously a boy. He looks almost like Jessica, maybe this was her elaborate way of telling him she had an illegitimate child sixteen years ago. Max laughs to himself (not out loud, because that would be weird) at the absurdity. Looking closer he noticed the boy's eyes. He remembers Griff saying something about them being green, but he didn’t think that they’d be  _ that green _ . The boys eyes are practically pierced into him. The effect maximized with the way the boy was pretty much glaring at him right now. Max finds his eyebrows furrowing, it’s a bit startling to see him glaring, but not completely out of the ordinary. He understands that expecting Aslan to be happy or even excited about meeting them is unlikely and utterly awful. So he draws his attention back to listening to what the lady— Synthia says next. “Aslan,” she starts, “meet Max and Jessica, they’ll be watching you for the next week or so.” Max goes to extend his hand, but feels the whiplash when the glare completely disappears and instead a pleasant smile greets him. The boy reaches his hand out.

“It’s very nice to meet you.” He says, his voice sickly sweet. Jessica takes his hand first, when Max doesn’t, she returns the smile. 

“It’s a pleasure to meet you as well.” She says. It is then that Max remembers that staring is rude. He hopes he didn’t look as ‘flabbergasted’ on the outside as he felt on the inside. The sudden change was strange, like two different people... He’s reading too much into it, isn’t he? What is it called… resting b-word face? (Goodness. He’s becoming such a dad, forgot how to swear even in his own dang mind. Jessica’s remarks about ‘language’ must’ve warn off on him over the years. Ever since the incident with Michael dropping the f-bomb at school.) Yeah, it must’ve just been the resting “unhappy” face. He seems like a nice boy so far? He doesn’t have any reason to believe otherwise. Especially if everything Griff said about the boy is true… Oh crap. He wasn’t listening again, was he?

“—so Jessica, Max, now that we’ve done our introductions. Why don’t I have one of you show Aslan here, where he’ll be staying.”

“Uhh...?” He starts, turning toward Jessica, she’s better at calling the shots. 

“I’ll show him to his room.” Jessica says, waving for Aslan to follow her. She then leads said boy down the hallway, pointing and muttering things about individual rooms as she does, the boy simply nods, Max notices the black bag slung over his shoulder. It’s small.

“Okay then Max,” Synthia starts, he snaps his head back towards her, “I just have a few things I need to go over with you.”

“Yes of course.” He nods. 

“First I’ll just need you to sign here, just to confirm that you will be responsible for his well being for the next few weeks. Or until you revoke responsibility. You aren’t required to sign it until after I debrief you, but—”

”I can sign it now.” He interrupts. She pauses, a little surprised. “I mean, I’m not exactly gonna kick him out tonight, am I?” He lets out a nervous chuckle.

“Alright then.” She smiles, it takes a moment to fetch a pen from her jacket, but when she does she extends it forward. He takes the pen from her, signing the neatest (but still very sloppy) version of his name onto the wrinkled parchment. 

“Okay. So, you probably want to know why he’s being relocated.”

“I didn’t think about that, umm, if you don’t mind telling me?”

“Of course. His house before this was for troubled youth. He was the only one living in the house recently. There used to be more kids, but they eventually ran away for good, or found new homes. The person who runs the home, a great man named Golzine, had a heart attack last night. Poor guy. They say he should be out of the hospital in a week or so, it’s just that we weren’t legally allowed to leave Aslan on his own, so that’s why I’m here.”

“Why us though? You said something about me being Griffs emergency contact right? What does that have to do with our ability to take care of his brother?

“Right. Well, as soon as we found out about Golzine, the guy had a heart attack in the restaurant just off of fiftieth street, lucky too, so many people around, they were able to get him help almost immediately. Anyways, we were looking for somebody to take him in, and we didn’t want to give him to some complete stranger. So we were digging around, paper files, computer files, just a whole lot of files. And while we were digging, we found out that you had recently signed up to be foster parents. So I called, you said yes. I drove over.” she smiles, he can only raise his eyebrows and nod. “About Aslan.” She grabs the file out from under her arm extending it to him. 

“Yeah?” He asks as he grabs it off of her. 

“I know I said he was in a home for troubled youth… but really, he’s a sweet kid.” she pauses a moment, “Oh! And, if you're having any problems, any whatsoever you’re free to call me. My number should be in that file there. If you're having any doubts either, it won’t be too much of a hassle to find somewhere else for him to go. And I know I said this over the phone, but you're really helping us out here, even if it’s just for the night.”

“It’s no problem, really.” He says scratching the back of his neck. Nervous habit he guesses. 

“Okay then, I’ll head out.” She says, pointing awkwardly behind her. He waits until she disappears around the corner of the house before closing the door, locking it. He sighs, fingering through the file. It’s just basic information, Aslan’s age, (he was right, he’s only sixteen.) and any health conditions or allergies (none thank goodness) he might have. Synthia's number is scrawled onto a sticky note at the front of the file. He’s sitting down now at the kitchen counter on a bar stool with his glasses on, still flipping through the pages when Jessica comes back. Her eyebrows are raised, “what’s the matter?” He asks, pulling his glasses off and pushing them into the table, “You okay?” Sticking a finger into his spot and closing the file. He looks over his shoulder. 

“Yeah, just a weird conversation.” 

“Weird? How so?” He tilts his head. 

“I can’t describe it. He— ugh…” She wipes a hand over her face, “I’m too tired for this… he just smiled and closed the door. Or, something along those lines, I mean— I don’t know, I obviously didn’t expect him to like us immediately, I thought him being polite would be lucky— be a good thing, but the way he acted was just… weird. It was too… sweet.”

“Too sweet? Did you see the way he was glaring at me before? It was right before Synthia introduced us.”

“You mean his resting grouch face?”

“Exactly.”

“Honey, I have a resting grouch face. That doesn’t mean anything. Because as you know, I’m a complete sweetheart.” Max scoffs teasingly. She cups his cheek with her hand. “I think we’re just reading too much into this.”

“Yeah,” he sighs, dropping his head, pulling his face away from her hand. “You’re right. Synthia said he’s a nice kid. It’s probably just a stressful night. For us. For him.” He puts his glasses back on. 

“Exactly...” she comes up behind him, wrapping her arms over his shoulders, leaning into him. “Watch’ya looking at?” He turns his head, looking at her through the corner of his eyes. 

“Oh, It’s just the file she gave me.” He says, picking it back up. “Nothing too interesting, just the basics about him. Nothing to worry about.”

“Alrighty then.”

“You should probably get some sleep. We still have to get Michael up and ready for school tomorrow.”

“You need sleep too.”

“I do. I just need to finish reading this. Then I’ll join you.”

“Alright.” She puts her hand on the edge of the door frame, “goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yea, so this was the first chapter. It’s probably trash, so roast it. Your hate fuels me. 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! Hope you liked it!


	2. “Why do beds have to be so dang comfortable?”

Ash has been sitting in the same stupid chair for about five hours now. His phone ran out of battery on hour two, and even then, there isn't much to do without wifi but sit and play an updated version of the old snake game. The chair is cheap and stiff, and makes his butt hurt like hell. He wants to get up and stretch, but he isn’t in the mood to draw attention to himself, because he knows. He knows as soon as his butt leaves that musty fabric Mrs. CPS-worker is gonna be on him, asking if he wants anything. He doesn’t want to smile for her today, he’s too tired. Besides, he’d much rather sulk when everybody’s too busy to pay attention. He’s hungry but it’s fine. Mrs. CPS-worker brought him a burger from some fast food place on hour six. He thanked her then, feeling guilty about the half eaten burger sitting at the bottom of the bag. He’s still a little hungry, but he’s too anxious to really care about that at the moment. So that leaves him here, on hour seven with a sore butt, and a bad attitude. (Not that he’s ever had a good one.) 

He’s drowning in boredom at the moment, hour seven and a half, there’s a kid crying somewhere, and he’s resigned himself to staring at the boring painting on the wall as he shakes slighty from the bobbing of his anxious little leg. It is in hour seven and a half, when he’s half asleep, that Mrs. CPS-worker comes running up to him, relief pooling off of her in the form of sweat. 

“Guess what!” Ash hums at her dreadfully cheerful voice. “I finally found someone to take you in for the night!”

“Good to know that I’m less than desirable.” He mutters sarcastically. 

“No no, of course not. It was just a hassle trying to find somebody who wouldn’t be a complete stranger to you.”  _ Oh great _ , he thinks,  _ probably one of Dino’s ‘friends’ then.  _ “That and we didn’t want you to have to relocate somewhere further away. So you’ll still be able to go to the same high-school!... now, I know you won’t be staying at this place for very long, but the stress of having your father in the hospital is probably already hard enough, and I didn’t want to make anything more difficult for you.” Ash mentally skips over the part where she called Dino his father, and reads straight to her intentions. 

“Thank you,” he says, and he is thankful, she’s working her butt off for him, just because she thinks it would make his day better. Although her intentions may be put into the wrong effort,  _ she’s giving you right to one of Dino’s ‘friends’, how much do you think they paid to spend the week with you?  _ he appreciates it nonetheless. 

“It’s really no problem at all.” she smiles at him. 

…

Compared to the stiff chair at the —what do they call it? CPS headquarters?— Mrs. CPS-workers car seats are a blessing. She gives him the option of sitting up front with her, but he ends up sitting in the back anyways. 

There isn’t a clock in her car or anything, so he can only assume that it's a fifteen minute drive to the house. She pulls up onto the driveway once they’re there. Unbuckling her seatbelt. Ash looks down, he’d forgotten to do up his own. Ah, well. You live and you learn. She gets out first, telling him to wait a moment. She leaves and gets back in two minutes tops, ushering him to follow her. 

He grabs the book bag beside him. Inside is nothing much, he only had a few minutes to grab the necessities (toothbrush, toothpaste, glasses etc.) before he was taken to ‘CPS headquarters’, he’d taken the time to grab some books off the shelf.  _ A Perfect Day for Bananafish  _ (a short story assignment for school) _ , Islands In the Stream,  _ (he had promised Blanca he’d read it eventually), and some other ones he’d read if he got the time, stuff like  _ Save Me the Waltz,  _ or his personal favourite  _ The Catcher in the Rye.  _ (a paper copy so worn down, pages were missing. (Not that it mattered much, he practically had the whole thing memorized by now.)) 

He follows directly behind Mrs. CPS-worker, somehow hoping that if he stays behind her he won’t have to go inside, childish really. Now Ash isn’t religious by any means, but he’s praying the face he sees isn’t Marvin’s. She steps aside and Ash is greeted with a middle aged man (big hoorah that Marvin’s fat face didn’t greet him), the guy looks kind enough, but Ash knows better than to believe first impressions. He’s seen enough of Dino’s patrons and they’re sickly sweet voices to be fooled by it now. 

She introduces him as Aslan, which is to be expected, but jarring nonetheless. She tells Ash that the people in front of her are Max and Jessica, (he’s surprised to see the woman there, not that Dino’s never rented him out to women before, just surprising because the ‘whorring industry’ is predominantly filled with men.) He finds himself glaring, without care. Until he realizes that Mrs. CPS-worker probably doesn’t have any idea what’s going on here, and that his sour mood will make her feel like somethings wrong with him, and if she believes there’s something wrong with him, then she talks to other CPS workers, and when she talks to other CPS workers, the chances of the police getting involved is astronomically high, and if the police get involved then Dino gets in trouble, and if Dino gets in trouble then all his hot shot money gets him out without a scratch, and when he gets out he’ll be mad. Mad at Ash… and Ash doesn’t think he’ll be able to deal with Dino when he’s mad again. He can only grimace when he remembers the first (and only) time he’s ever tried to run away. So Ash pulls himself together and puts on his most convincing smile, he extends his hand out to the man in front of him. “It’s very nice to meet you.” Except the man is being all weird and takes a second too long to shake his hand. The woman takes it instead, returning the pleasantries. 

“It’s a pleasure to meet you as well.” Her smile almost looks genuine, he looks away from it. Looks like the doofus finally got his head on straight because he’s putting his hand out to shake. Ash shakes it, the man's hands are a little sweaty. Which is just— gross. It makes him wonder if this is this guy's first time renting out a boy. He shudders a little at the thought, but if that's the case, it might make his night a little easier. Newbies usually take less time. 

Mrs. CPS-worker then uses the excuse of ‘showing Aslan around’ so that her and doofus can have a ‘grown-up’ conversation. Which is surprising since (from his very small interaction) it seemed like Miss Business ‘Jessica’ is the one who wears the pants. She chats to him, keeping the conversation flowing as if he was giving her better answers than a simple nod. She leads him up a couple stairs before ending at a hallway. “That,” She points to the room on the left a few meters behind her, “is me and Max’s bedroom… This,” she points to the room directly to her right, “is Michael, our sons, bedroom… and this one right here,” she points directly in front of her to the room at the end of the hall, “is the room you will be staying in.” Ash nods, “now, I only showed you a little bit of it, but it’s late, and I will give you a better tour in the morning. The beds just right here,” she turns on the lights, “there’s a desk too if you ever want to use it, everything in here is free for you to use, just don’t destroy anything, bathroom is just opposite Michaels room.” She stops, “if you have any questions, feel free to call for me or Max, we’ll be more than willing to help you out. But anyways… have a good sleep, I guess.” They stand there awkwardly for a moment before Ash smiles, nods and closes the door. He doesn’t know what to say, and he’s too tired to come up with something to say. 

He waits until he hears her footsteps clunking down the stairs before sitting on the bed. He thinks about emptying his bag, but eventually wonders what the use of unpacking will be when he’ll just be packing it all back up in a few days. So he rummages around the pockets for a charger, cursing to himself when he comes up short. He holds down the power button on the side of his phone for a second hoping miraculously that it’ll turn on. It doesn’t. 

Ash knows he won’t be able to sleep. Because he also knows sooner or later that they’ll show up at his door, that maybe they’re trying to catch him off guard. He knew that some creeps got off to unconscious people, what makes ‘Max’ and ‘Jessica’ any different? 

Ash says he’ll stay awake all night. But on hour twenty-two without any sleep, he lets his eyes slip closed for a second too long. And without even getting under the covers, Ash sleeps. 

_ Why do beds have to be so dang comfortable? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I’ll try to update this every Sunday, but I’m a very inconsistent person, so I’m sorry if I miss a week.
> 
> +As soon as I have a rough estimate of how many chapters this will be, I’ll update the chapter count. (20 chapters at least.)


	3. "Did Dino put you up to this?"

Ash wakes up not even four hours later, to the sound of somebody walking around the house, and the pleads from both parent and child. 

“I don’t wanna get up!”

“Michael, just put on your clothes, we’re going to be late!” 

“But I don’t wanna!” The child— Michael —yells. 

They’re almost right outside his door, and he finds himself unsure of what to do. Should he just stay up here until they leave? Should he help (he doesn’t know either of them so that’s pretty much out of the question)? Should he sneak past her and go downstairs? And then what? Stand in the foyer awkwardly until somebody tells him what the hell he's supposed to be doing? Yeah, no. He chooses the former, sitting on (his?) bed in silence. It’s only a few more minutes before the child —Michael— gives in, sighing dramatically, stomping down the stairs. 

Ash assumes that they’re talking about going to school, unless they aren’t. Unless he just sat there and listened to a kid pleading not to go to— to— he’s fighting his thoughts now, remembers the camera, clicking, clicking, over and over and over. The clicking sound as consistent as the clock, clicking, clicking—

—The front door clicks closed. Ash’s eyes shoot open. He’s fine. The child —Michael, he reminds himself again— is only going to school. That has to be the case. He’s only overreacting. Just like he always does.

Ash sits and waits for his heartbeat to slow. It’s been only ten minutes since he last checked the time. 8:24. He sighs to himself. He’s already decided he wasn’t going to leave the room, so he pulls his bag up into his lap and grabs the poorly stapled together short story of _A Perfect Day For Bananafish_ and his battered pair of glasses and starts reading. It’s only 8:49 by the time he finishes it, and he’s getting all antsy, waiting for something to happen. He snatches his worn down copy of _Catcher In The Rye._ Reading has always helped with his nerves. He hopes glossing over his favourite book will calm him down. 

It doesn’t. 

It’s now 9:12 and he feels like jumping out of his skin. What the hell is happening? Shouldn’t somebody be— I don’t know? Talking to him? Letting him know what’s going on? Is this another one of Dino’s tests? Seeing how long before Ash takes a dive out the window?

Ash can’t take the silence, the out of rhythm tick-tocking of the clock. He can’t take it. So he won’t. He makes his way to the door, opening it quietly. Wincing at the creak of the hinges, he peeks around. Barely relaxing at the empty hallway. 

The walk down the stairs is torturously slow. He’s tensing himself up after each step. All senses on high alert. It's exhausting really. 

“You’re up.” Ash just about falls down the rest of the way when he hears the voice materializing behind him. It's far away, but still too close for comfort. He turns and sees the doofus from last night, ‘Max’ he thinks was the man's name, standing at the top of the stairs. He looks surprised. 

“I am.” Ash answers, cause he doesn't know what else _to_ answer. usually he’d come up with a snarky comeback, but some part of him still believes this is all a big plot. a way to trick him. It's confusing as hell, but Ash has been surprised before. “Do you have any idea what i'm supposed to be doing right now?” It comes out harsher than he means it.

“School?” Max suggests, “That would be my best guess.... Synthia—“ Ash assumes he’s talking about Mrs. CPS-worker, “—said that you go to a school close to here? M.I. high, right?” 

“That’s the one.”

“Horrible name for a school really, ‘M.I.’ makes it sound like it's a mental institution.” Max laughs to himself. Ash can do nothing but stare. _What the hell is wrong with this guy?_

“Right,” Ash starts, “school started at 8:15, why didn’t you wake me up?” Ash doesn’t voice his real concern out loud, _because if that’s where you were really taking me, you would have woken me up at the right time._

“Wake you up? Kid, you went to bed at like four in the morning, and that’s if you even fell asleep the second you shut your door… Besides, I already called the school to let them know you’ll be late.” Max says, brushing it off. _Dino would have killed me for missing school... unless, of course, it was because I had ‘work’ at the same time._

“Oh… Ok.” 

“Why don’t you go get some food? Then we can head out.”

“I…” Max comes down the stairs then, showing Ash to the kitchen. The pantry is absolutely huge, (it’s smaller than Dino’s, but Ash isn’t allowed to go into the kitchen, let alone the pantry, everything has to be chef made and approved. Aka: Dino approved.) it makes his stomach clench, thinking about Dino. “I’m not hungry.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Ok, but you should at least take a granola bar.” 

He does, shoving it into the bottom of his backpack when he goes back up the stairs into (his?) bedroom, along with the fifteen bucks Max gave him for lunch (“sorry,” he said, handing him the crumpled bills, “I’d make it, but Jessica’s better at the lunch making. That and she doesn’t trust me not to burn the house down making a peanut butter sandwich.”). _Guess he knows how to buy someone off… not very subtle though._ Ash wouldn’t have taken the money if the guy wasn’t so insistent. 

He checks the clock again, it’s 9:24 when they leave. 

The car ride is tense. He can’t tell if that’s his doing, or the doofus’ doing. Max had tried to talk to him, only made things worse. Jessica was way better at keeping one sided conversations.

Ash thinks the tenseness comes from the knowledge both of them share, _you really thought he was taking you to school did you?_ Man, Ash can be such an idiot at times. 

He watches the houses pass by through the window. Max hasn’t turned the radio on, (Does he even know how to?) so it’s quiet, way, way too quiet. Conversations are awkward, but the silence is painful. Ash thought he was antsy before, but now he doesn’t even have the pleasure of moving around. He feels Max’s eyes on him, but when he looks over all the doofus is doing is looking at the road. His gut is screwing with him. He knows it. 

“Did Dino put you up to this?” He snaps. Regret sinking in as soon as the words leave his lips, except he doesn’t get the reaction he thought he would. Max is looking at him all confused. 

“Dino? He’s your foster dad right?” Max chuckles, “you hate school that much?”

“I—What do you mean...?”

“‘Did Dino put you up to this?’—” Max mimics Ash’s voice, (not well, Max is horrible at impressions, (his voice went deeper?)) “—You make it sound like taking a kid to school is some elaborate trick.” Max chuckles again. Then the car stops, Ash looks over. _They’re at the school. They’re… at the school. Why are they at the school?_ Ash looks back over at Max. “Have a good day.” He says. And— He’s blanking for thoughts. His hand instinctively reaches out to open the door, pulling on it as soon as his fingers wrap around the cool metal of the handle. He’s stumbling out of the car now, taking one look back at Max. Ash tries his best to smile at him, (well, not at him, the dashboard is close enough) not entirely sure he pulled it off. His face feels stiff. 

“Thanks for the ride,” he says, hitching his bag onto his shoulder. 

“It’s no problem.” Then the door closes. The car drives off and Ash makes his way through the familiar school grounds. 

_Why—?_ he doesn’t even know what he’s trying to ask himself. It feels like somebody took a calculator and tried to divide by zero. He forces it out of his mind. He has more pressing matters. Always has more pressing matters. 

He makes his way to the front desk of the school, where an older lady, with a bob cut, impatiently scribbles his name and the time (9:40) onto a small piece of coloured paper. Ash looks at the electronic clock on the desk, it’s actually 9:48, but eh, she got it close enough.

After that he heads down the hall to his locker. It takes him three tries of spinning that stupid little knob back and forth, 3625, for it to unlock. Annoyed, he snatches his binder and textbook for biology out of the mess. He makes it to his classroom, B1, quicker than usual. Once he’s there he stops and knocks on the door. No answer. He knocks again, louder. 

“Uhh… Mr. M, I think somebody’s knocking at the door…?” Ash barely hears one of the kids in his class say. 

“Can somebody get the door?” the teacher calls out in a muffled voice. 

A second later a random girl in a red hoodie is in front of him, opening the door. The classroom is dark as usual, something playing on the smartboard projector. He says thank you and steps past her, pushing the small paper onto Mr. Mannerheim’s desk. The older man nods in acknowledgment. Ash takes a look at the whiteboard, apparently the class is watching some documentary about the opioid epidemic. He looks back at the class, most of them on their phones, or they _were_. 

“Take your seat and follow along. We’re in section 12 of our booklets.”

Ash nods before sliding into his spot third from the back. He hasn’t even gotten his pencil out before Shorter is leaning over his own desk,

“Where the hell were you? I tried texting but you wouldn’t answer.”

“Aw, were you worried?” Ash teases. 

“Hey,” Shorter says, voice serious, “you and I both know you never miss school unless you— unless you...” Shorter trails off, eyes hidden perfectly behind his sunglasses. Ash sobers, looking down at the things on his desk, he feels bad. “What happened?” Shorter asks, voice too thick for Ash’s comfort. He takes a moment before looking back up at Shorter with an expressionless face. 

“Long story short: my phone died, and the old fart had a heart attack.” He states, opening up his binder. Shorter's head comes further away, he looks at Ash with scrutiny. 

“Is he alive?”

“Yup.” He says popping the ‘p’, “Luck of the Lynx.” Ash then turns his attention to the screen, “Except now they have me living at this different place for a few days.”

“With who?”

“A thirty-something couple and their kid.”

“Sounds better than living with Sir Dickwad.”

“Yea, but they’re weird as hell.”

“Okay but—”

“ _Callenreese_ !” the teacher interrupts, waggling his fat finger, half the class snaps to attention, the other half waking up, “You did not walk into this classroom _late_ , to have a _chat_ . Same goes for you, _Wong_.”

“Sorry,” Ash salutes with two fingers, giving the teacher a cheeky smile, “won't happen again. Mr Man.” 

“Yea, yea, now pay attention.” Mr. Mannerheim swivels his chair back around. Once his attention is captured by whatever is on his computer screen again (hentai, most likely) Ash leans over to Shorter,

“I’ll talk to you after class, yea?” Shorter gives him the ‘ok’ symbol. Though he isn’t sure what there is to talk about, nothing too interesting has happened. Yes, Max and Jessica are quite possibly the weirdest people he’s ever met. Is it something Ash wants to have a conversation about? 

Absolutely not. 

…

The next class is nothing new. So ash waits the 90 minutes, getting up as soon as the bell rings.

Speed-walking to the class he knows Shorter has just before lunch. Ash spots him immediately, via the iconic purple mohawk, (How did he ever convince Nadia to let him get that?) and waits as he packs up. (Shorter was always the slowpoke.) 

They walk in silence for a bit, bumping into the other students who are rushing to get the cafeteria desert before it’s gone. He thinks about getting a slice of pizza with the money Max gave him, before remembering how uncooked the dough was last time, nasty stuff. 

They make their way to the lunch room, stealing two plastic chairs from another table, pulling it up to an empty one. Not bothering to ask the kids they stole it from if the chairs were being saved. They sit, careful not to touch the muck resting on the table's surface. 

“Are you okay?” Shorter asks once they’ve settled themselves.

“As okay as I’ll ever be.”

“Like, these people aren’t with Dino?” he leans in, looking at Ash over the rim of his sunglasses. “You’d tell me if they were with Dino, you promise me you would?”

“I would. I promise. But, no.” Ash says putting his elbow onto the table, pressing his index and thumb gently onto his eyes. “They aren’t… I don’t think, at least.”

“That’s... good.” Shorter says, relaxing a bit. 

“I think so too.” 

“You worry me.” 

“Don’t, you’ll go bald.”

“Stop,” Ash stops. “this is serious… I—” he’s now running a hand through his hair. “I— look, Ash…” he says carefully, “I know you hate it when I ask you this but now that you're with them… with people that will-- I don’t know-- give a crap... why don’t you just—?”

“I’m not telling them.” Ash says. Not leaving any room for pussy-footing. 

“Why not?” Shorter says, his voice rising. “You said it yourself, they’re not with Dino, right? Why can’t you tell them? They’ll help you.”

“I— I can’t.”

“If you’re scared then I’ll help in any way I can… you know me and Nadia would be there for you so why don’t you just—”

“No.”

“Why?!...” Shorter snaps, “Why. The. Hell. Not?”

“I just—” Ash lowers his voice, “I just… can’t… I don’t—” he sighs, “you remember what happened the first time I tried to run away?”

“Dino, that fat piece of—” 

“Yes,” Ash interrupts, “Yes, I know. And you know too.” He sighs, running a hand over his face. “Nadia and you have helped me so much over the past few years, and you know I’m always going to be thankful for that… But there’s nothing I can do but wait until I’m old enough. Or until, I dunno, he’s old enough, and actually dies from a heart attack, like the fat bastard he is.” Shorter pulls his sunglasses off, inspecting the table with far too much scrutiny. 

“I just wish I could help you.” he whispers. Ash looks away. 

“I know.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I’m not entirely sure how end notes work lol, I’ll figure them out eventually.
> 
> Anyways... so looking at all the stuff I want to go over for this AU, I think this fic will be a lot longer than I thought. *sweats nervously* what have I gotten myself into?
> 
> Haha, well...
> 
> The next chapters gonna contain nothing but a bunch of fluff, bet you can guess who Ash is gonna meet ;)
> 
> \+ Also, before I forget. I’ll try and get each chapter to at least 2k words. I aim for more, but my average is usually only that. (Quality over quantity ammiright??)


	4. “...What the hell is an Edgy?”

Ash ends up exiting the lunch room without eating anything. He’s hungry, but he thinks if he eats anything he’ll be sick. 

Shorter was quiet the rest of the time. Ash feels like a jerk, feels like ditching Shorter at lunch would’ve left things better. Been easier on both of them. 

Ash didn’t say anything to him when he left, but to be fair, Shorter didn’t say anything either. 

  
Waiting the 90 minutes through his third block was painful, he couldn’t concentrate on any of it. He wants to go and apologize, _Shorter deserves a friend so much better than me._ But Ash knows he’ll just be inconveniencing him more.

He has English last, his favourite class. So, even though he’s feeling like crap right now, the knowledge that he’ll get to delve into someone else's problems within the novels they read, and forget about his own makes his chest feel a little lighter. 

He waves to Blanca as he strolls into the classroom, walking all the way to the back. The class has it set up with two desks right next to each other, and in front of them another two desk, In total there are three columns of two, and four rows. 

He hooks his bag around the backrest of his chair using the backpack strap. Sitting down, Ash pulls his now (very) wrinkled copy of _A Perfect Day For Bananafish_ out. He thinks they were supposed to be reading it for this class, (once a keener always a keener,) but doesn’t find himself caring. Blanca will probably give him something else to read as some kind of ‘punishment’, knowing full well Ash loves the extra assignments.

The class starts as usual, with Blanca writing something up on the whiteboard like he’s a psychology professor in college or something, except instead of writing ‘ _A Perfect Day For Bananafish_ ’ on the board like Ash thought he would, he writes ‘Eiji’.

... _what the hell is an Edgy?_

Eiji Okumura, turns out, as Blanca finishes writing the full name down, is the asian boy standing awkwardly in the class doorway. 

Blanca waves him in, directly to the front of the class. Some kids snicker at the obvious uncomfort the boy is displaying. Blanca merely ignores them, “This is Okumura Eiji, or as we would say it here in America, Eiji Okumura. He is new, so you will be nice to him. You all know the rules, any sass and your out of the class.—” the rule used to be ‘any sass and you’re out on your… ‘ _rear_ ’, but the principal just about had a stroke when he saw it hanging up as an ‘inspirational quote’ in all caps on the white board, “—Understood?” The class nods. “Ok, Eiji, since there's only one spot left unoccupied I’ll have you just sit there, it’s the one right at the back.” Blanca points, “Also, I don’t have any extra copies for you, so just hang tight for today’s class.” Eiji nods and starts walking towards his desk. 

That's when Ash looks to his right, at the _unoccupied_ spot at the back, which just so happens to be right next to him. _Dang it, this guy’s probably not very good at keeping his stuff in his space, which means I'll have to passive aggressively move his stuff back over the line. Or maybe he’s left handed and we’ll keep bumping our elbows together, and then we’ll both have to apologize like it isn't the most annoying thing in the world._ Ok, yeah, Ash knows he’s making stuff up, he’s more or less just upset he’ll be losing the empty seat next to him. _Mega desk, gone forever._

Mr. Okumura, (he’s not gonna butcher the name again if he doesn't say it, checkmate) sits next to him. The class moves forward, and this time Blanca does write: ‘ _A Perfect Day For Bananafish_ ’ on the board. So, Ash is currently resting his cheek against his palm, unconsciously drumming his finger on the table. 

It’s only been a few minutes when he feels somebody tapping on his shoulder, he jumps a little and looks over, the boy's face greets him.

“I am Eiji Okumura!” he says excitedly sticking his hand out, “and you?” Ash shakes his hand, albeit a lot less enthusiastically.

“I’m Ash.” Mr. Okumura tilts his head, 

“Ashu?... Like cinders?” Ash raises his eyebrows, not missing the cute ‘shu’ added to the end of his name.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Nice!” Mr. Okumura exclaims— he needs to find out how to pronounce this boys name, Mr. Okumura is way too formal for the likes of this enthusiastic kid in front of him, —he stops and looks around, “I have no…” he struggles for words, waving his hands in the air, “book… to read.”

“Oh,” Ash slides his copy over to E— Eidgee—Ayjee—Ayjay—Ei— the boy, “You can borrow this one, I’ve already read it.” The boy grabs the book from him, letting his smile light up the room.

“Thank you very much!”

“Don’t mention it.”

…

Turns out Blanca isn’t giving Ash any other assignments until he can, as Blanca had mouthed to him from across the room, ‘stop being a punk and read _Islands In The Stream_ ’ (never insult Blanca’s favourite book, he is ruthless). 

So that's what he’s doing, until he wasn’t. (Blanca left the room a minute or so ago (probably to get Ayjay a copy of the short story they’re reading), so Ash doesn’t have to worry about Blanca getting on his back about not reading.) Ash’s eyes unconsciously drift over to the person beside him. Ash calls it _new kid syndrome_ , you can’t help but look at the new kid, why? Who the hell knows, Ash sure doesn’t, but he’s looking at him anyways.

The boy— Ash has settled on the pronunciation of ‘Eijay’, —has black hair, darker skin (who doesn’t have darker skin than Ash? He’s practically a ghost,) black eyes that are small, but are so puppy-esc they look huge— okay, here's a better description, take a rabbit and a kitten, squish em together, and voila, you’ve got Eijay— okay yeah, that pronunciation definitely doesn’t sound right, maybe it was more of a—

“Why you are looking at me?” Ash’s arm slips over the edge and his head just about hits the desk. _Crap. I was just staring at him wasn’t I?_ “Hellooo, nosy American?” The boy is now waving a hand in front of his face.

“Oh my— I am— I…” _holy mother of all things that are holy, what do I say, and why am I so flustered?_

“Are all Americans this nosy?” The boy pouts, actually pouts. Ash squints at him. 

“...no...?”

“Just you then. Very good.” He pats Ash on the head. Actually _pats_ him on the head. _What the—?_ Ash is sitting there lacking words. _Please… oh please if there is a god out there somewhere tell me i’m not blushing?_

“No— I— what do you—” He’s gaping, why is he gaping? _Why am I gaping? What kind of curse did this guy put on me?_ He has no time to think about it when all of a sudden the boy keels over and starts shaking, Ash looks closer… he’s crying. He’s hiding his face, and he’s crying. _What did you do Ash? What the hell did you do?_ Ash is freaking out, he grabs onto the boys shoulders. “I am so sorry, did I say something?” _How in the hell did you make a boy cry on his first day of school? How the—?_ “What did I say? I’m really, _really_ sorry. Please I—” then the boys face turns upwards and he’s… laughing. He’s laughing… at Ash.

“I am sorry!—” the boy says in between fits of bright giggles, “—you look so serious, and then you were all—” he laughs again, impersonating Ash by opening and closing his mouth like a fish. Ash pulls his hands off the boys shoulders, crossing them. 

“Wow. Give me a heart attack, would you?”

“Hey, I was not the one looking at you!”

“That was— I was just—” the boy interrupts him,

“You American’s are so sensitive!”

“Yea, but at least I’m not a sadist.”

“Oh, you too harsh! You not know of true Japanese fun!” he smiles, “you Americans would die in Japan, you not even know about Kancho.”

“Do I want to?”

“Probably no, your small American brain might explode.”

“Hey!” he says, actually affronted, “it’s _bigger_ than _yours_ !” And _oh…_ Eijee’s laughing hysterically now. “That’s not what I—” but Ash is looking at him, really looking at him, at the boy who's laughing his butt off, and he can’t help but smile, and now he’s laughing. They’re both laughing, at a _dick joke_ nonetheless.

It’s not even _that_ funny, but Ash finds himself unable to breathe. He tries to justify it, why he’s laughing more than he has in months, years even. It’s stupid, really stupid, but he enjoys it. He enjoys laughing with a boy whose name he can’t even pronounce properly.

“So... your name.” he says once Ayjay has wiped the mirth from his eyes. 

“My name?”

“You're gonna hate me for this…” he mumbles, shaking his head, “it’s Ayjay right?”

“Eiji.”

“Edgy?”

“Close, but no… Eiji.”

“Eejay?”

“You hopeless, _hopeless_ American.”

“I’m joking!” Ash puts his hands up in surrender.

“Then say it properly.”

“Aggie.” Eiji smacks him on the shoulder.

“Ok, now you just play dumb.”

“Fine! Fine…” Ash laughs, sitting up straight, testing the word on his tongue, “...Eiji?” the boy looks at him for a moment before his smile breaks through. 

“Bingo!” Eiji shouts. Then there’s a bunch of shushes coming around them. “Sorry.” He whispers. A moment passes before he smiles again. “It looks like you do have a brain in that big head, and because you are such a nosy American, I do not think you would mind helping me with this?” Eiji points to the (very) wrinkled copy of _A Perfect Day For Bananafish_. 

“Why do you need my help?” Ash questions.

“I am Japanese not American. You tell me why you need help reading Japanese book?”

“Cause I don’t know a lick of Japanese.” Eiji pauses, stroking his chin like he’s deep in thought. 

“Sa-you-na-ra.” He says, enunciating each syllable.

“...Huh?”

“Honestly, you have never watched anime? It means goodbye.”

“Sa-you-na-ra?” Ash copies back.

“Amazing! and guess what?”

“What?” Eiji’s smile turns devilish.

“Now you know lick of Japanese. No excuses for you!” Ash face palms.

“Ok, but, aren’t you practically fluent in English? You just held a conversation perfectly fine. Other than a few errors here and there I’d say you're doing good.”

“Thank you for compliment. But, speaking different from reading. Your English characters are very much stupid looking and what is it with the ‘c’? sometimes it want to be ‘k’ and sometimes it want to be ‘s’.”

Ash audibly sighs, (not because he’s annoyed, but more or less because he wants to tease Eiji,) “fine. I’ll help.” Ash swipes the book back, opening it to the first page. You start, and I’ll jump in if you make any mistakes? Sound good?” Eiji nods enthusiastically. He points his finger to the top of the page below the text and starts to read, 

“The’e were nee— ninety-seven New Yorku advertisement— sorry, advertising men in the hoterll, and, the wae they were mow-no-poorl-ize-ing… monopolizing the wrong— long-distance calls. the gir-rl in five-zewo-seven had to wait from noon tirll amost two-thirty to get haar carrl throw— threw.”

“See?” Ash gestures to the book, “You can read perfectly fine. You don’t need my help.”

“Okay, I lie a little…” Ash’s forehead is getting red now with all the face palming, “but I do need help! It is not the reading. I can read good, the problem is that I do not know what I read when I read. I am fine with simple conversation, and spelling things out. But you crazy American books are too complicated.” he points an accusatory finger at Ash, “You volunteered to be my human dictionary—”

“When did I do that—?”

“Hush!… You volunteered to be my human dictionary... so that is what you will be... now,” Eiji points to the entire short story. “What does it mean?” Ash resists the urge to drop his entire head on the table. _This is going to take a while._

Except for some reason, as Eiji continues reading, somewhere _deep down_ … 

Ash doesn’t think he minds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aight. So in case you can’t tell, I was going for manga Eiji, because even though he’s got a slight language barrier, it doesn’t stop him from being a sassy angel. <3
> 
> \+ the next chapter will be the end of the ‘introductory’ chapters, from then on it’ll start getting deeper into plot and backstory. (And angst! So be prepared)
> 
> \+ I’m not entirely sure when Christmas break begins, but for obvious reasons I won’t be updating during the holidays. I might (that’s a very loose might) update, but don’t expect anything :P
> 
> \+ big thanks to everyone who has left comments and kudos’! (I’ll always respond to comments when I can!) Although I’d still write this if no one was reading, the support really motivates me! So thank you all! Hope you liked this chapter :D


	5. “You wanna play superheroes with me?”

Ash tried to slip away from fourth block early so he could buy a charger from the 7-11 across the block, but as soon as he steps out the door he sees Max sitting in his car.  _ The guy is on his phone _ ,  _ so maybe if I just walk slowly he won’t see me— _

“Aslan! I’m over here!” Ash thinks about ignoring him, but remembers that it is physically impossible to explain how he couldn’t hear the man from ten feet away. That, and all the times he tried to pull the same stunt on Marvin.

Ash climbs into the car without a word. Sitting his backpack onto his lap.

“How was school?” Max asks as he drives off the school grounds.

“Same old.” Ash replies, looking out the window. 

By now he has accepted that Max isn’t the devil incarnate. Doesn’t mean he trusts him, not by a longshot. People change in an instant, he knows that all too well. But… for now Ash believes that he might just be living with an ordinary couple. 

_ Famous last words.  _

“Hey, michael,” Max looks over his shoulder into the back seat, “can you say hi to Aslan?”

“Hi!” Ash hears from behind him. “I’m Michael!” Ash adjusts himself so he can look into the back of the car. A small boy in a superhero booster-seat greets him.

“Hi michael, I’m Ash.” Michael is smiling at him all bright and cheery, 

“Guess what!?” 

“What?” Ash asks, trying his best to entertain the kid in front of him (behind him?). 

“No you gotta guess!” he pouts. 

“You...” Max chimes in when Ash takes a moment to respond, drawing the word out, “think your dad is awesome?”

“No, silly!” Michael giggles. His ‘L’s sounding more like ‘W’s at his age. 

“Wow! Just break your old man's heart!” Max clutches his chest, Michael laughs harder. “What did you do today, bud?”

Michael pauses for a moment to make sure everybody is listening, “I ate a bug!” 

“A bug?” Max chuckles, “why’d you eat a bug?”

“Jeremy brought some chocolate covered crickets for lunch!”

“That’s awesome, did you like it?”

“I did!”

The conversation continues, Ash zones out halfway through, looking out the window.

“Ash…?” Max questions after a moment.

“Yeah?” Ash startles.

“No I mean— you go by Ash now?”

“Yes, I do,” Ash nods, adding after a moment, “if that’s alright?” 

“That's totally alright, sorry about calling you Aslan,”

“It’s no big deal.”

The car ride is awkward… to everybody except for Michael. He’s babbling excitedly about the rest of his day at school. Ash listens along, enjoying the white noise. 

They get to the house in no time. Ash waits with the door half open until Max pulls his keys out of the ignition and steps around the car. He’s standing behind Max and Michael as they walk to the front, still waiting behind them as the door is unlocked. 

As soon as it’s open he sees Michael bolt into the house. 

“Mommy! We’re home!”

“Hi Michael, how was school?” he hears Jessica say. 

“I ate a bug!—”

“—a chocolate cricket.” Max pipes up before Jessica freaks out. 

“That’s…” he can hear her mentally gagging, “very nice dear.”

After taking off his shoes Ash stands there, unsure of what to do. How to interact with people who aren’t gonna (or if he’s being honest  _ might not _ ) hurt him. He knows how to play the part of the prostitute for Dino, play the part of the delinquent at school, knows how to be himself around Shorter. (Or rather, he tried to play the part of the ‘cool best friend’, but Shorter saw through him too easily.) He thinks of all these parts he plays, the parts he’s played for so long, and wonders which person he’s supposed to be.

Jessica suggests that he take a seat in the living room. So that’s what he’s doing, sitting at attention, trying to take up as little room as he can. 

Michael comes into the same room as Ash a second later with a cheese string hanging out of his mouth. He starts playing on the floor with a collection of superhero action figures, every once in a while making ‘whooshing’ and ‘bam’ noises with his mouth as if he’s playing out a very dramatic action movie. 

Ash’s mind drifts to earlier. He had convinced Eiji to get a library card, with the promise that if he went and brought some easy reading level books to school the next day, Ash would be his ‘human dictionary’, as Eiji had so kindly put it. Ash laughs at the thought. That guy was good, had convinced Ash to be his English tutor for free. And the best part is that Ash doesn’t even mind.

The boy— Eiji (Ash has to keep saying it or he’ll forget how to pronounce it entirely) —is definitely a sorcerer or something. 

Ash is dragged from his thoughts when Michael comes running up to him. 

“You wanna play superheroes with me?” he asks.

“I— uhh…” he pauses;

Ash Lynx doesn’t play games, he’s a prostitute, a murderer, he’s nothing. He doesn’t even know  _ how  _ to play games. He’d ruin it for Michael. He knows he would. He’s about to tell Michael that when the kid in front of him makes the biggest pouty face.

  
  


“Pleeeaase!” Michael begs, pulling on Ash’s arm. Ash tries to resist the puppy dogs eyes, because he wouldn’t.  _ Couldn’t.  _ There is no chance, ever, not in a million years, that he would ever,  _ ever _ —

So he’s playing superheroes with Michael. 

Except he’s not sure what to do. He’s sitting criss-cross-apple-sauce on the carpet, awkwardly watching as Michael moves an action figure of superman around in the air. 

“C’mon! You can’t play superheroes without a superhero!” Michael scooches closer to Ash, picking up another figure off the floor, “here—” he drops the toy into Ash’s hands, “you can be Batman!”

“O-ok” Ash isn’t sure exactly what he’s supposed to do, so he just holds the toy awkwardly up in the air. 

“You gotta make whooshing noises when he flies around!” Michael yell-whispers, “and you gotta move him around more too.” Ash does as he says, albeit a little hesitantly. 

“Whoosh…?” Ash is embarrassed to hear the sound of his own voice. When in the world has that ever happened to him? He’s heard it enough times in all of the videos Dino has— he ends the thought.  _ You’re with a child _ .  _ A child who knows nothing of the disgusting life you’ve lived. You’re ruined and he’s not. _ Ash shakes his head, looking the boy in front of him,  _ You were the same age— _

“Kachow!” Michael full-out yells, smacking his toy into the one in Ash’s hand. It startles him a moment, dragging him from his less than pleasant thoughts. “Is that all you got Batman?!”

“Uhh…”

“Now you gotta make a cool comeback like in the cartoon!” Michael whisper-yells around the backside of his hand. 

Ash clears his throat, speaking in a lower voice like he assumes a superhero would, “uhhh, no it is not, Superman….?” 

“Then show me your worst!” Michael jumps up, and taps Ash on the shoulder, “you’re it!” 

Ash feels something childish grow inside him, he’s never played tag, except for maybe once in a forgotten memory from his days with Griffin in cape cod, he knows the rules at least, they’re easy enough. He gets up too, standing awkwardly at first. Michael is in front of him, a few feet away. 

Ash lunges forward, but with all his training Michael expertly dodges, waving at Ash to ‘come and get him’ in the most second-grade taunt Ash has ever seen. Ash crouches down into a ready stance. 

_ Game on.  _

Ash goes for him again, but this time Michael takes a dash to the middle of the living room. 

He’s on the other side of the coffee table now, laughing almost maniacally. ( _ Do all children laugh like that? _ ) Ash mentally shrugs. He is trained in the art of subverting expectation, so he makes a quick jolt to the right, Michael runs, another high-pitched squeal of joy leaving his throat, before Ash dodges back over to the left, he catches Michael on the shoulder. “You’re it!” Ash calls. Michael laughs again, already turned around and chasing after Ash. 

Ash is running around the table now, and the funny thing is that he’s trying, he’s  _ actually  _ trying, but getting around those stupid little corners with his gangly legs is harder than it looks. Michael catches up quickly, tapping him on the back. Ash lets out a fake sound of discouragement before whipping around, trying to surprise Michael, see if he can make him laugh more. 

Except Ash sees Jessica watching from the doorway and all the blood in his body is surely going to his cheeks. 

“Sorry! I didn’t ask if I was—”  _ wow,  _ Ash is really getting comfortable with all the apologizing. He wants to pound his head into the wall. “—allowed to be running around here, I just assumed that—”

“Oh there’s nothing to worry about.” she waves off, picking Michael up and holding him in her right arm, he adjusts himself so he’s facing outwards, making sure he can get a good look at the superman figure in his hands, “Michael rarely has someone else to play with… me and Max try our best, but we’re still busy people, and we don’t always get the time to play games.” 

“What do you do?” Ash questions, taking the opportunity to change the topic of conversation, “for work I mean?”

“Oh, we’re both journalists. Only difference is that I work for a big hotshot company, whereas Max is more of a freelance journalist… I make most of the money,” she laughs, putting a hand next to her mouth as though she doesn’t want someone to hear, “don’t tell Max I said that though, it’ll break his already fragile ego.”

“What’s this about a fragile ego?” Max walks in, clueless. 

“Oh it’s nothing.” She laughs, before raising her eyebrows at him, “what’s going on? Shouldn’t you be finishing up your column for the local newspaper? Isn’t that due on Thursday?”

“I was working on it.” He states, “but Synthia called.” Jessica pauses before the name registers, she puts Michael down. 

“Go play upstairs for a bit ok?” she says, crouching down to his level. 

“Okay!” He runs off, stomping up the stairs. Jessica turns back to Max. 

“Why’d she call?”

“So… Dino.”

“What? Is he already out of the hospital?” Ash butts-in, he knew he’d go back eventually, but the thought of it being so soon makes his chest heavy. And he  _ knows _ , just  _ knows  _ Dino will keep him home for a week to ‘make up for lost time.’ A ghost of a hand creeps its way up his thigh, ‘ _ You gotta appreciate being alive’— _

“Worse.” Max says, and Ash turns and looks at him, refrains from snorting, thinking back on the last eight years of his life,  _ it can’t get that much worse,  _ “Turns out that he hit his head when he fell, the doctors thought it was only a minor concussion. But when he didn’t wake up a few hours after they resuscitated him, they realized it might have been worse than they thought, so they did a CT scan and— Ash…” Max pauses, looking at Ash all pitifully, he hates it when people look at him like that,

“he’s in a coma.”

Max says the words with a little wince, scared that Ash’ll freak out about it. Start crying maybe? It’s quiet a moment as he takes the time to register the words. Except he feels no inclination to cry.

Ash is trying his hardest not to laugh. Feels the bitterness crawl up his throat. All he can hope for now is that some poor old nurse will accidentally unplug the life support when looking for a place to charge her phone. Ash feels the surge of another laugh try to come up, he forces it down.  _ Now wouldn’t that be absolutely fantastic. _

“So you’ll be staying with us for a bit longer.” Max says carefully. Ash forgot about that part, but as long as Dino’s ‘basically‘ dead, he doesn't mind staying with a bunch of weirdos. “Synthia said the doctors told her they didn’t know when he would wake up,” Max continues, “it could be anywhere from next week to a few months.” _Years if I’m lucky. Forever might be a stretch, but if I wasn’t just about the most open minded person to a stretch like that—_

“Ash, are you okay?” Jessica’s asking it. He can’t let them see he’s smiling, might think he’s a sadistic psychopath, so he claps a hand over his mouth.

“Can I go to the bathroom?” he questions, because he isn’t sure how to ask to go to (his?) room.

“Of course.” Jessica says, and the way she says it makes Ash want to burst into a laughing fit all the more.

He walks to the bathroom quickly, trying his best not to let his shoulders shake.

Once he makes it there he shuts the door, resting his hands on the edge of the counter, letting his head swing down. He laughs silently, he knows Max and Jessica think he’s crying, but that only makes his wheezing grow stronger. 

_ It’s all just temporary.  _ He reminds himself,  _ but holy hell if Dino in a coma: helpless, trapped in a bed, without any will of his own, isn’t just about the funniest thing I’ve ever heard. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So i’m not 100% happy with this chapter, but oh well.
> 
> This is the end of the introductory chapters, if you couldn’t tell by my ‘coincidental’ plug in of the fic name there at the end. :P
> 
> In other news, the song ‘this town’ by niall horan gives me huge Ash/Eiji vibes. But like— post canon so Ash is dead. Basically it’s Eiji singing about wanting to be with Ash in the first verse, then the second verse is dead Ash singing about seeing Eijis interactions with Sing. (Not an Eiji/Sing shipper, but you can look at their relationship however you want.) then the end of the song is them singing together. ...anyways, can’t listen to that song without being sad anymore just because I made that connection :D 
> 
> +Merry Christmas everybody! (Or happy Hanukkah or whatever you celebrate!) I’ve got a few chapters already done, so if I remember, I’ll post next Sunday.


	6. “Did I dream this whole thing up?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warnings can be found at the end of the chapter, so as to not spoil for those who aren’t in need of any warnings. But for those who are, they’re there for you. I will be putting trigger warnings at the end (along with a note at the beginning notifying you that they are there) of any chapters I think are bad enough to have to contain one. So be safe, and I hope you enjoy.

Ash had been laughing his socks off for the past five minutes now in light of everything going on. He can’t help it.  _ Guess Karma really does exist. _ And to think of all the times Dino made him feel like that, trapped, helpless, alone--  _ it’s just,  _ Ash doesn’t have the right words for it. Happy isn’t quite the one he’s looking for, hell Ash doesn’t even remember the last time he felt that. He thinks his happiness must’ve been shipped off to Iraq with his brother. Left there to die.

“Hey Ash?” Jessica knocks, it startles him out of his thoughts. (She called him Ash, he hadn’t noticed that before, Max must’ve spread the news.) Ash looks at the door, paranoia forcing him to check that it’s still locked. He realizes that he’s probably supposed to be answering her, he takes a second to clear his throat.

“Yeah?”

“Uh, I’m going to go run some errands, michael’s coming with me… Max will still be home, so if you have any troubles you can just find him in the computer den, It’s just passed the stairs.” 

Ash nods, most likely looking like an idiot (glad that no one can see him), before realizing that she doesn't have x-ray vision, “Ok.” he says, loud enough for her to hear.

“The TV is out here too, along with the remote, feel free to watch whatever you want… umm...” He can feel her fishing for something to say, maybe some inspirational quote that any other mother would say, “Goodbye.” she says instead.

Ash doesn’t say anything back. Would’ve nodded to her if there wasn’t a door in the way. Goodbye feels too… intimate?  _ What am I to these people?  _ His mind wanders,  _ well what were you to Dino?  _ He recoils at the thought.  _ No _ .  _ That was different, this is different. What makes you so sure?  _ Ash settles for silence. Settles for  _ nothing _ .

He leaves the bathroom a minute after he hears the front door shut. He knows Jessica said he was free to use the TV, but he feels too much like an intruder. He doesn’t know what he would do if they were to come home and see him just sitting on the couch watching a show. Just the thought makes him feel embarrassed, imagining them scrutinizing him for anything he picks. Might make them realize that he’s nothing but a dead weight, leaching onto them. Might make them realize just how worthless he is. Make them see the only thing he’s good at. Make him  _ perform. _

He knows deep down that he’s making conclusions out of thin air. Knows that they wouldn’t care if he watched something on their stupid television, (why else would she offer?), but the possibilities are endless and he’s only known these people for a day.  _ Just because they don’t want to have sex with a child doesn’t mean they’re good people.  _ His mind supplies. And… man, how the hell did Ash’s bar for human decency get so low?  _ Ah, maybe it was all the human indecency?  _ He’s a foster kid after all, Dino’s wasn’t the only house he stayed in.

Ash grabs his backpack from one of the hooks by the front door and hikes up the stairs, his memory (a basic skill required to survive living with the devil) leading him to his— the room he is staying in. 

He settles down on the desk across the room, pulling out his books. He catches up with his English first, who knew goofing off with someone during the entire class would put you behind in your studies? Ash always used to hate the loud mouths in school, and now he is one.  _ What a day? _

He reads some  _ Islands In The Stream  _ when he’s caught up _ ,  _ just as a way of staying on Blancas good side. Now he can say he has real proof that the book sucks. (It doesn’t actually suck, Ash soon finds himself being proven wrong,  _ stupid Blanca having good taste in books. _ ) The thought irks him, because as much as Ash likes to say he’s really smart, he’s not quite as smart as his mentor. Lack of experience being the main contributor.  _ Stupid old men _ .

He gets up from the desk two chapters from where he left off, deciding that the comfort of a bed is much a more suitable place to read. 

His head starts bobbing by the time he gets three chapters from where he left off. Exhaustion clawing at his eyes. He fights it. What is he a child? It’s only six or so for goodness sake. He takes a guess that it must be something wrong with him. His survival instinct is all out of whack, without the constant threat of Dino scheduling any last minute ‘appointments’

He wants to stay awake. Hates the feeling of not being in control of his body. But there’s not much you can do when you're fighting against yourself, except delay the inevitable. 

So, it is when he reads five and a half chapters from where he left off, that his eyes slip closed, the lack of sleep catching up to him.

He isn’t sure how long he’s out for. 

…

“Wake up, Ash.” It’s a deeper voice, and something inside Ash recoils at it. “Wake up!” A sharp sting on his cheek accompanies the yell. His eyes shoot open. He’s met with a dark room, it’s familiar, and the familiarity weighs his chest down. 

“Wh—where am I?” He stutters. He doesn’t need to ask, he knows where he is. He was here yesterday.  _ Was it yesterday? Did I dream this whole thing up?  _

“You don’t know?” The booming voice laughs. Ash’s cheek pulses painfully, it’s probably a bright pink by now. “You’re home sweetie.” Ash’s grip tightens around the silk sheets, he hates the feeling of silk. Hates everything about this room. Hates the poshness. Hates that no matter how  _ clean  _ the sheets appear or how many times they’re replaced, they’re still stained with more blood, sweat and tears than any bed sheets should be. Ash hates the pretences most of all. Hates pretending that everything’s fine. “Now get up. You’ve got to clean the mess you made.” A hand shoots out and grabs his hair, intertwining their rough fingers through his golden locks. He gasps at the pain. Bringing his hands up, trying to relieve the pressure. It drags him into a sitting position. Stars are dancing in the back of his eyelids. 

“What do you mean?” He grits out. The voice comes closer, warm breaths brushing against his neck. It makes him shiver. 

“Oh, maybe you forgot?” The voice taunts, “Grace doesn’t love you anymore.” Now that…  _ hurts.  _ Hearing her name hurts. “She left you in the only way she knew how.”

The hand drops him then. Ash hits the ground. His elbow stings. The floorboards are cold under his hands. He bites his nails into it, scratching the wood to alleviate the pressure building behind his eyes. 

“You know nothing about her.” He chokes.

“Maybe so. But I know  _ you  _ sweetie.” A weight comes upon his back, Ash struggles against it, his breaths coming out quicker. It’s one voice, and all their voices at once, it makes his stomach churn. Because he knows each one individually.  _ Got to know them individually _ . Got to hear them breathing, wet and ragged. Feel them pepper unwanted kisses along his neck, sloppy and greedy. It makes him gag. The smell of cheap cologne and cigarettes.  _ They all smell the same.  _ It’s crushing him, the weight of them all as they groan, pressing into him.  _ They all smell exactly the same.  _

“Get off of me!” He begs, panic seizing him.  _ Don’t argue. Don’t argue. It only makes things worse.  _ But his throat is closing up and he can’t breath. He can’t  _ breath.  _ “ _ Please! _ ” 

There’s a noose around his neck, he’s dangling from the abyss’s. He can’t  _ breath.  _ He’s choking. He’s  _ always  _ choking. Hands. Millions of them. Crawling along his skin. Feeling. Touching. Intruding. He wants to claw them off, he tries to. But he’s on the cold,  _ cold  _ floor. Pinned under an invisible weight. Helpless. Alone.  _ Afraid.  _

A soundless scream erupts from deep within him. Years of training to be quiet. To be invisible. Bringing him to a moment of quiet torture. Dino wanted him to be invisible. Except Dino always put him on display. A prize to be won. A prize that  _ he  _ won. So maybe it was less about being invisible, and more about being perfect. His perfect porcelain  _ doll.  _

Ash is awake. But that doesn’t stop the nightmare. Never does. 

His eyes are open now too, and he isn’t drowning in silk sheets anymore. The harsher duvet under his sweaty palms grounding him in reality. But the knowledge that it was only a dream. A  _ sick  _ nightmare. Does nothing. His heart is beating too fast, and the air around him is too thin. He’s dying. Slowly. Silently.  _ Alone.  _

Maybe dying would have been easier.

He throws the blankets onto the floor. The weight of the covers, just a little too suffocating. He whips the door to the bedroom open, still taking care into not making any noise. He makes it to the bathroom down the hall quickly. Flicking the lights on. 

He barely makes it to the toilet before he hurls up the contents of his stomach. Nothing but bile really, he hasn’t eaten anything since that burger Mrs. CPS-worker gave him (what? two?) days ago. He coughs violently into the toilet bowl. Standing back up on shaky legs, he takes a look at himself in the mirror. 

He can’t get his thoughts together quite yet. The reflection is fuzzy. He struggles to turn the tap on, lowering his face and splashing water onto himself when he does. The cold bite allows him to think a little more clearly. He’s still shaken up. The feeling of a body on top of his, crushing him still all too real. He doesn’t dry his face, letting the cool air brush against his skin. He looks up into his jade eyes. 

He looks… well, he looks like a dog took a dump on him. He’s sweating. Shaking heavily. And all-out just mentally exhausted, and yet, wide awake. His hair is tousled, guess he owes that to the fingers running through it at the moment. But despite it all;

He looks at himself. His jawline. His perfectly chiseled jawline. His lips,  _ perfectly  _ shaped. His nose, his ears, even his hair.  _ Perfectly  _ golden. And his eyes. His eyes, which just had to be the  _ perfect _ shade of green. 

_ Perfect  _ for Dino. 

It’s like whatever god out there is playing some practical joke on him. Gave him the features anybody would kill for. And yet he hates it. Hates his face. His body. Hates that his looks are the only thing that’s kept him alive all these years. Except he can’t help but wonder what his life would have been like had he been ugly.  _ Maybe coach would have gone for some other kid— _ he stops the thought there. Hates himself for thinking about the alternatives. Hates how much he wishes that the perv would have raped someone else that day. 

“I hate you.” He whispers to the reflection. He isn’t sure what he believes the thought will accomplish. What saying it aloud will do. Maybe he believes that his reflection will respond, tell him all the things he already knows.  _ You’re broken. Worthless. Nothing but a doll. Meant to be used, abused, then thrown out once it loses its glimmer. How long until people finally notice you’ve been dull this whole time? _

He shakes his head, then pinches himself.  _ You don’t hate yourself. You're just pitying yourself. You stupid peice of— _

Ash tears at his hair. Trying to get the feeling of Dino’s hands  _ out.  _

He slips to the floor. The smell of cheap cologne and cigarettes burned into his nostrils. The only sign of tears intermingling with the undried water on his face is the blurring of his eyes. He doesn’t want this. He doesn’t want any of it. Never wanted any of it. 

He shuts his eyes, but all he can see are their faces. He tries to drown them out, by pressing the palms of his hands into his eye sockets, but they’re still there. Still breathing down his neck. 

He isn’t sure how long he lays there for, hoping that it’ll all just go away. 

The door is locked; he gets some sleep.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warnings:  
> Ash dreams about his past, although not hugely graphic, still might make people uncomfortable. Mentions of Rape/Non-Con.  
> This is as bad as it gets for the most part.
> 
> Onto chapter notes:
> 
> 100 kudos’! I never thought I’d get 2, let alone 100 people who even remotely like this! So thank you all so much! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas (Hanukkah (is it over yet? I’m not versed in Hanukkah sorry) or any other holiday you celebrate!) 
> 
> \+ so, okay. This chapter wasn’t even supposed to happen, the nightmare was only supposed to be a hundred words or so, but it transformed into a whole chapter. Hell, I wasn’t even planning on writing a nightmare! But you don’t need to know that...
> 
> \+ so, for chapters. I still don’t know how many chapters there will be. But I do know how many major sort of “plot points“ I want to get through. (18 plot points) I don’t know how many chapters it will take to get through those though. Because the first plot point took 5 chapters (introductory chapters).
> 
> Some of these plot points might only take 1 chapter, and others might take as many as 10. *phew* (what did I get myself into?) 
> 
> Anyways... Thank you all! The next chapter is not going to have all that much drama in it, but it is going to be a setup for a future chapter :P


	7. “You’re a lunatic, you know that right?”

“Ash? Is that you in there?” Jessica knocks. Worry seeping into her words. Ash’s head shoots up, disoriented. He looks around, looks to where his head was resting… on the toilet seat. He scrunches his face in disgust. “Ash, are you okay?”

“Y-yes!” He answers, before stumbling onto his feet. 

“Okay…” she says, not entirely convinced, “school starts in twenty minutes so you’ll have to hurry up if we want to make it there on time.” Ash hums to let her know she was heard. He then turns the tap on, not caring to listen for when she leaves.  _ The door is locked. You're safe.  _ He twists the knob to the left, annoyed when the water gets warmer. He turns it the opposite way, waiting as it cools, not taking his hands out of the water until a numb feeling takes over the stinging pain. He washes his face, to wake himself up, and to forget that it was indirectly touching someone’s butt a second ago. (Not that it hasn’t been forced to touch one directly before.)

And thus begins Thursday. Day two of living with the Lobo-Randy’s (Ash feels bad for Michael having to live with that atrocious last name for the rest of his life) and things are still just as awkward as they were the day before. 

Ash thinks he wouldn’t be so awkward if they weren’t so awkward, and maybe they wouldn’t be so awkward if he wasn’t so awkward. It’s like they’re feeding off of each other’s awkwardness. Heavens, Ash hates it. 

_ —or rather _ , Ash corrects himself,  _ everyone is awkward except for Jessica. That woman just doesn’t give a crap about the room atmosphere. _

She somehow coerces him into eating half a bowl of some trashy cereal before they leave, and just as Max had said she would the day before, Jessica makes him a lunch. 

He says thank you; day one of being Mr. Goody-Shoes having commenced. See, Ash has figured out that the best personality to play up around these people is that of the ‘perfect child’, this way, he doesn’t draw attention to himself, aka: they leave him alone. And he gets to remain on their good sides.

Ash thinks about talking to Blanca about his report card. Wonders about the best way to reinforce the idea of him being the perfect child, but thinks better of it. That, and the anxiety crawling up his throat. 

Dino hates his grades. Why wouldn’t Max and Jessica?

No point in making his time here hell if he can help it. 

Jessica ignores the bathroom fiasco, from both today and the day before, ushering him to the car with the amount of force and care only a mother could instill.

She drives him to school, along with Michael who is sitting impatiently in the back. Ash ignores the way the kid kicks the back of his seat. It’s endearing, _and yet_ , so, _so annoying_. 

They drop Michael off first, who gives Jessica a peck on the cheek. 

“Love you mommy!”

“Love you too kiddo.”

Michael waves goodbye to him, and Ash is hesitant to wave back, he thinks  _ screw it _ ,  _ what harm would it do? _ but by the time he makes up his mind the kid has already turned his back, running into the school with all the other children. 

Ash can already feel the question on her lips before she says it. 

“Are you okay?” She asks, he’s about to respond when she does it for him, “—and I don’t wanna hear any of that ‘ _ I’m fine _ ’ bullcrap I get from Max all the time.” 

“I—” he needs a second to restart the ‘witty response’ file in his brain, “I don’t get what you’re trying to say?”

“Kid, you fell asleep in the bathroom.”  _ Scratch that, she’s bringing up the bathroom fiasco.  _

“...and?”

“... and what?” she takes her eyes off the road a moment to look at him, “People don't sleep in the bathroom!” When he doesn’t say anything, her face morphs into a look of bewilderment, “really?” she questions, Ash is mentally shrugging right now, and it’s not the casual shrug, but more of the ‘I don’t know what the hell to tell you’ kind of shrug. When he still doesn’t respond her expression multiplies, “ _ really— _ ??” her hand is out now, gesturing to him in confusion, “I— nevermind.” She gives up, putting her hands in the air as a sign of surrender. She mumbles to herself under her breath, “crazy kid.” 

She flicks the radio on, and some generic pop song Ash has never heard before starts playing. 

It isn’t long before she turns into the school parking lot. Grumbling curses at the kids to walk faster across the road, it’s when they’re waiting that she looks to Ash, “I should probably let you know, Max will be the one to pick you up today—“

“—actually,” Ash interrupts, grabbing his backpack, “I’ve got to meet up with a tutor after school, so I can just walk back or catch a ride afterwards.” She pauses,

“You sure?” Ash is thankful that she didn’t question him needing a tutor. “It wouldn’t be a hassle to have either of us pick you up. When does it end?” 

“It ends around four-fifteen. But I don’t need you to pick me up, really, I think it’d be better if I were to walk.”

“Okay, you know the way home?”

“Yup,” he nods, she does too. She puts the car in park.

“Well,” she reaches over to open the glove box, grabbing a pen and a napkin, she writes something down, “this is my phone number. In case you need us to pick you up.” He takes the napkin, shoving it into his jean jacket. 

“Have a good day at school.” She smiles. Ash almost says ‘you too’, but catches himself, 

“Thanks.” She drives off,

…

Ash gets to Bio as quick as he can, hoping to talk to Shorter before class begins. Shorter isn’t there yet, and with each second Ash is getting more and more antsy.

“Can someone turn the lights off?” Mr. Mannerheim calls out. The same girl from yesterday, the one with the red hoodie, runs up and flicks the lights. She’s about to close the door when Shorter slips through. “You’re late,  _ Wong. _ ”

“Hey!” Shorter calls out defensively, “the bell hasn’t rung yet!” It is at this opportune moment that bell decides to ring. 

“It has now.” The teacher points out, and Ash thinks he can see the devil horns growing underneath his balding hair, if the curled smile he gives Shorter wasn’t enough to go by. 

Shorter sighs dramatically, turning around in defeat. Before he whips out a single slip of paper and smacks it onto the teachers desk, flashing him a toothy grin. Mr. Mannerheim grumbles to himself, swiveling around in his chair, and announces what they’re doing for the class in the same manner a spoiled brat might, “we’re watching the rest of the documentary from yesterday…” he pauses, looking straight at Shorter who’s sliding into the desk beside Ash now, “and you better pay attention!”

Shorter does a sitting curtsy in the man's direction, which makes the old man grumble even further. Except this time he shuts up and presses play. 

Ash waits until Mr. Mannerheim is invested in whatever’s on his screen, and half the kids are asleep before turning to Shorter. He can’t stand the quietness anymore. 

“That guy really is the biggest douchebag.” Ash whispers to break the tension, making fun of teachers was always a safe middle ground. Shorter laughs softly. 

“Don’t worry,” he whispers back, “I always bring an extra late slip.” Shorter grins, gesturing for Ash to look down at his pocket, which, as Shorter demonstrates by taking out a handful, is filled to the brim with brightly coloured slips of paper. “I stole a bunch from the office when Miss. Secretary wasn’t looking.” Ash snickers behind his hand.

“Dude, you realize that you get marked absent if you don’t sign in with her when you’re late?”

“Wait, seriously!?” Shorter yell-whispers. 

“Seriously.” Ash can see the existential dread on his face. Ash laughs harder. 

“Nadia is going to kill me.”

“I’m sure she won’t kill you.”

“Ash.” Shorter reasons, “you’re practically an angel to her. You know nothing of her dark side. And,” he emphasizes, “even if she doesn’t kill me—”

“— _ when  _ she doesn’t kill you—”

“— _ if  _ she doesn’t kill me… then I get the mom-guilt.”

“Mom-guilt?”

“Sister-guilt whatever you want to call it.” Shorter explains, “it’s a fate worse than death.”

“Yea okay, whatever.”

“You underestimate its power my dear friend.” Shorter leans back, “See, it’s a skill that all members of the female population hold.”

“And what exactly is this ‘power’?” Ash asks, making quotation marks with his hands. 

“It is the power to make you feel bad about something even when logically you did nothing wrong.”

Ash rolls his eyes, “you’re a lunatic, you know that right?”

“Hey,” Shorter laughs, “I’ll have you informed that I wear that as a badge of honour.” He puffs his chest up. 

Ash smiles at his antics, wants to keep joking around too. But he can feel the elephant in the room now, and he knows he needs to address it. They need to talk about things. 

“Listen, Shorter,” he rubs his eyes, “about yesterday…” 

“Ash you don’t have to worry about it—“

“No, this is something I need to tell you.” Ash looks up from his desk, “I’m sorry,” he says, “I wish I could do what you want me to do— I really,  _ really _ do— is it’s just— I just—”

“I understand…” he interrupts, “believe me…” Shorter rests a reassuring hand on Ash’s shoulder, “for what it’s worth, I’m sorry too.” —he cuts in before Ash can say anything— “not about what I said yesterday, because I will always stand by what I said, and I will always feel like I’m not doing enough for you… but I am sorry in the way I spoke. It isn’t fair to you. To beg you to do something you can’t. I know it isn’t. It just—” he sighs, “it’s just hard.” Shorters pulls his arm back, wrapping it across his chest. The ambience of the room cuts in. Letting the real world exist for a moment around them. 

“We’re good now, right?” Ash almost whispers, turning to look Shorter in the eye. The party in question looks surprised. 

“Of course!” He affirms, “You think you’re gonna get rid of me that easy?” Ash chuckles in response, lightly elbowing Shorter in the arm. 

“We should pay attention.” he says, pointing to the projector at the front of the class, “that is, unless you want Mr. Stick-Up-His-Butt to get mad at you again.”

“One,” Shorter holds up a finger, “Mr. Stick-Up-His-Butt is  _ always  _ mad at me. And two,” he holds up a second finger, “why should I pay attention in class, when  _ technically _ I’m not even here?” 

Ash shrugs. “Touché.”

... 

They eat lunch together like they always do. It’s nice, because even after two-and-a-half years of knowing each other, Ash still isn’t used to being forgiven so easily. He was a jerk to Shorter yesterday.  _ He was just looking out for you and you had to go and spout lies just because you’re too much of a chicken to tell someone what’s really going on…  _ Ash was a jerk and a coward… But Shorter forgave him anyways.

It’s halfway through the eating block and Ash still doesn’t fully understand why. 

In other news, Shorter laughs at him when he sees the note Jessica left in his lunch. (It wasn’t anything gushy, just a sticky note telling him to have a great day at school.) but Shorter had howled nonetheless. And even though Shorter is laughing at him, it’s not necessarily  _ at  _ him. It’s different to all the times Dino would strip him when he was younger. Watch his discomfort and laugh. Laugh at him for a lack of body hair, for being ‘ _ smoother than a baby’s bottom _ ’. It’s different because Ash almost feels like he can laugh along. It’s different because he’s having  _ fun.  _

Ash eats most of the lunch Jessica packed him, decidedly chucking the rest. 

…

Ash gets to English a little earlier than usual, sneaking out of his former class before the bell has rung. He waves to Blanca as usual, and takes his seat. Pulling a random book from his bag. 

Ash nearly jumps out of his skin when Eiji slams a stack of children’s books on his desk at the beginning of class. He looks at Ash with this scary all-knowingly look on his face. And all Ash can do is glance at the tower of paper and cardboard and raise his eyebrows. 

Eiji merely laughs, almost like a villain from one of those Japanese cartoons. 

“Don’t we have work to do?” Ash asks, unconsciously sizing up the stack of books in front of him. 

“That is hardly important.” Eiji shushes, “we are working on the same thing as yesterday, you are done by now? I assume?.”

“Who’s to say I’ve got my homework finished at all?” 

“Says the boy who has read his reading…” he fumbles, “whatever the word is,” pausing, Ash listens as he strains for the word, “dokusho kadai… dokush—“ his face brightens, “assignment! Says the boy who has read his reading assignment before it was meant to be turned in.”

“Well maybe that was a one off thing?” Ash challenges, “Maybe I’m a horrible student?”

Eiji looks at him up and down. Then gives him that squinty expression. Before dismissing him completely with a wave of a hand. “You are a good apple, Ash…” he continues, as he looks absentmindedly through the stack of book covers, “if anyone has the work done, it is you.” It’s silent a moment before Eiji backtracks, “if that is how the saying goes?” he wonders, “I do not get it though?” He tosses a book to the side. “Why is a human an apple? Is that not an insult—?”

Ash zones out a bit.  _ A good apple.  _ That’s what he called him.  _ A good—  _ he knows Eiji is wrong. He knows it deep down, has known it for years. Ash is  _ anything  _ but good—  _ But… _ the words… they still make his chest feel lighter. An airy and warm feeling taking hold. He likes it. He likes this overwhelming feeling, and he can’t quite place why. 

He smiles, the first genuine one in a while. It’s small, but it’s welcome. He thinks it has something to do with the beautiful Japanese boy sitting next to him. 

Something about Eiji is contagious, and Ash knows he’s caught it. 

He’s caught it good. 

...

They read books for the rest of class. Ash knows Blanca sees the ‘leaning tower of children’s books’, and Ash can do nothing but smirk when the older man simply shakes his head, before getting on with whatever teaching business he needs to attend to. 

Ash turns his attention back to what’s in front of him. He likes spending time with Eiji. More than he probably should. Likes the danger that comes with not knowing what to say, because somehow the kid (or senior as Eiji has been quick to let him know) is always two steps ahead of him. 

And although it’s disappointing to see Eiji go when the bell rings, it’s short lived when Blanca gets up and shuts the door. 

Any other place, any other person that thought would have terrified him. Being locked in a small room with a man he knows full-well could take him in a fight. 

Except Ash knows the drill. 

He pulls a book out of his backpack, purposefully not  _ Islands In The Stream  _ because he’s trying to be difficult _.  _ (It’s basically a running joke at this point.) Along with a small container, from which he pulls his battered reading glasses. He slides them onto his face, pressing them right up against his nose. 

Blanca, at the same time, is grabbing a book from the mini shelf behind his desk and opening it. He leans back in his chair, and puts his feet up next to his computer. He pulls his glasses down to the bridge of his nose, like a professor from a prestigious college might. 

They read. For an hour straight. No interruptions. No words. Not even a thought. 

_ So yeah,  _ Ash has decided,  _ today was an okay day. _

The first one in a while. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I'm sorry not much happened in this chapter. I guess you could call it the calm before the storm?
> 
> Next chapter we meet someone else.
> 
> :)
> 
> Don’t smile it’s not going to be a happy thing.
> 
> :(
> 
> There we go.


	8. “Yeah, well, Dino isn’t exactly here now, is he?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... I was bored...
> 
> https://imgur.com/a/ek48aRm
> 
> You may be asking, GreyWithAnE? Did you literally just make fan-art for your own fan-fiction? Yes. Yes I did.
> 
> ______________
> 
> Minor TW, found in the end notes.
> 
> ______________

Ash isn’t one for sentiment.

Not since he was seven at least. That’s how old he was when it first happened, wasn’t he? Not even in grade three.

He doesn’t like to think about it. Why would he? Who recalls the day they became a whore with pride?

Ash isn’t one for sentiment because he knows that everything he owns could be taken at a moment's notice. He’s gotten good at keeping a few items away from Dino’s clutches, his copy of  _ The Catcher In The Rye  _ and his glasses being prime examples. There used to be others, but those, along with everything else, had been taken from him. 

He doesn’t remember everything he’s lost. Especially to all the times Marvin never brought him back to Dino’s, spending money on sleazy hotels. 

It is all these reasons for why Ash’s heart stops when he sees the black sedan parked at the front of the school.

He’s not sentimental, but everything he’s kept through all these years is in his backpack.

He should walk away. He should walk past the car, run maybe, and never look back. He  _ should.  _ But he  _ can’t. _

The windows are tinted, but that doesn’t really matter, he knows who’s inside. 

His legs carry him forward, right to the passenger side of the car door. He doesn’t open it, but he knocks. He expects the window to roll down, and the smell of cigarettes to waft out. 

The window stays shut. He smells cigarettes. 

It’s not a memory. 

Sometimes both realities mix, it’s happened before, where Ash can’t tell if what he’s feeling is real, but this isn’t one of those times. He smells it, thick and overwhelming. It’s there, and he can’t move. 

“Hey, movie star.” 

Ash whips his head around in a split second, but It all feels like an agonizing eternity. He sees the bastard's face, and logically he knows that just because Dino is practically dead it wouldn’t mean that the man in front of him would be too, but he’s running on instinct at this point. His instincts are telling him to back up. And he does, his spine pressing up against the hard surface of the car behind him. 

“What are you doing here?” He glares, schooling his previous expression as best he can, but even a toddler could see the way he’s grasping for something,  _ anything _ . He’s cornered.  _ You idiot.  _

“What? I can’t pay my favourite little pet a visit?” The man steps closer, hand extended, and Ash twists his head, shutting his eyes. He feels a calloused finger caress his cheek, and any thoughts on Ash’s tongue dies at his lips. Marvin scoffs. “Still just as much a scaredy cat as the first day I met you.” His pinches Ash’s chin, “Get in the car.” 

Ash’s eyes shoot open. He looks to the fat face in front of him, and he _ — can’t. He can’t do this again.  _ Ash swallows the bile building at the back of his throat.  _ Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.  _

Marvin takes a puff from his equally fat cigarette, blowing it in his face. Ash forces himself not to choke, thick smoke filling his lungs, “it’s Thursday” he reasons, hating the way his voice wavers.

“Yeah, well Dino isn’t exactly  _ here,  _ is he?” Marvin flicks the ash from his butt to the pavement, he looks at Ash from behind his sunglasses and smirks, “so it looks like the deal has  _ just _ been changed.” Marvin turns and starts walking, gesturing to the door behind Ash, “now get in the car.” Ash looks behind him, and the black of the windows is consuming him, if he goes in there— his backpack is here— he’ll lose it all—  _ This isn’t about the backpack. It’s never been about that. You coward. You just want to get out of ‘work’.  _ Ash is forcing his eyes shut almost painfully now,  _ did you forget what you are?  _ He— he has to get back to Max and Jessica’s house by five, or they’ll get angry at him, they’ll send him somewhere else,  _ they’ll hurt him— they’ll— they’ll— don’t argue. Don’t argue. It isn’t worth it. Just get in the car. Just please for once do as you're told. Don’t make this harder. Get in the car.  _

”I— I need to get back to their house.”

It isn’t more than a whisper, but Marvin rears his ugly head, gripping Ash’s face, squeezing his cheeks painfully into his teeth. “What did you say, you little slut?” Ash’s throat is thick, he tastes blood.  _ Shut up. You're not supposed to argue. You’re a whore, whores don’t argue.  _

“I said I need to get back to Max and Jessica’s house before five or they’ll start to worry.” It’s still a whisper, and he can feel Marvins hot breath on his neck. See him straining to hear Ash’s words. He slams Ash’s head into the side of the car, holding it there. Marvin grits his teeth, speaking right into Ash’s ear. 

“You think I give a hoot about what your ‘found family’ thinks you little faggot?” Marvin shoves his face away. “Get in the car. Or I’ll put you there.” He lifts his hand away, but Ash is still reeling. 

It’s the same feeling. Suffocating.  _ He can’t breath.  _ He can’t breath.  _ Shut up. Don’t argue. Be a good little boy. Do as you're told. And  _ never  _ say no. Sluts don’t say no. They like it.  _ You like it, don’t you?  _ Shut up. Shut up.  _

Marvin’s hand latches around the upper part of Ash’s arm. He’s cursing into his ear, it rings. The car door is open, he’s shoving him in.  _ No—  _ yes,  _ no please. Get it the car. I don’t— I can’t— don’t argue. Don’t argue. You can’t argue.  _ Ash is tearing himself away.  _ What are you doing? Just go with him. Adapt. You always do. So flexible, just like a good prostitute.  _ He can’t— _ I can’t— Breath. Brea— why can’t I breath? Please, I can’t do this— help me— _

He hears noises. Someone’s yelling? Or maybe talking loudly? There’s noise. What's happening?  _ Why—?  _ Ash is sitting down.  _ Thrown down?  _ On the pavement? It’s hard under his skin, he gets a grip of the pebbles under his palms for just a second. He sees someone in front of Marvin, a dark shadow, gripping at his wrist.  _ Is that where the yelling is coming from?  _ Ash is still having trouble breathing.  _ Get a grip.  _ His fingers hurt. His tongue is heavy with something metallic.  _ He can taste them.  _ Ash thinks he pukes, something acidic falling from his mouth like bitter molasses. Staining his lips.  _ He can still taste all of them.  _ Someone’s grabbing him now, lifting him up. A car? They’re moving. He’s moving.  _ Think. Think you idiot. What do you see? _

_ Leather _ . 

_ My jeans.  _

_ A window.  _

_ Backpack. _

_ Trees.  _

_ Where am I? I’m in a car. I— I don’t know whose car. Why don’t I— I can’t— no, calm down. Calm down. What do I remember? I saw Marvin— Marvin got mad. He got mad cause I was being an idiot. So where am I? I’m in Marvin's car. What do you do when you’re in Marvin's car? You play along. Why? Why do I let him— you do it so he doesn’t kill you, remember? September 21st, two years ago? Why do we remember this? Cause it was the worst day of my screwed up life.  _

Ash takes a deep breath to steady himself. 

_ Lavender. _

Ash smells Lavender. Why does Ash smell lavender? Marvin doesn’t smell like lavender. There’s only one person in Ash’s life who smells like lavender. 

_ Blanca.  _

Ash looks to his left,  _ why is he here?  _ He sits up, groaning in the process, and looks at his hands, he scraped them up good. Bits of gravel stuck to his skin. He glances around and sees his backpack down by his feet.

“Welcome back to earth.” Blanca says, not unkindly. The noise still makes Ash’s head hurt a bit though. 

“Yeah, yeah.” Ash rubs at his hand, a little surprised at the scratchy-ness of his throat, “What happened?” He says, trying to play nonchalant, to hide how scared he is for the answer. He doesn’t like it, not being in control of himself, not being… sober, if that’s the right word, because that little scene sure as hell wasn't him on drugs. He doesn’t like not knowing what his bodies up to, especially when he's with ‘clients’. ( _ If what Marvin did to him could even be considered a transaction. _ ) “Did—” Ash’s throat clenches,  _ Did Marvin have his way with me?  _ He tries to say, but his tongue isn’t forming the words.

“You had a panic attack if I’m not mistaken.” Blanca states, before turning his blinker on.

“What?” Ash asks mindlessly. The dinging of the car distracts him from what he knows Blanca is saying.

“I think you had a—” 

“Yeah,” Ash interrupts, he clears his throat, finding his manners, “I mean— yes, sorry… I heard you. I guess my brain just isn’t working right now.” He chuckles nervously. It’s been a long time since he’s had a panic attack. Been a long time since he’s felt those few minutes, however long it was, that seem like an eternity. Those few minutes that make you feel like you’re dying.  _ When even was the last time I’ve had one of those? _ He used to get them daily, when Dino first took him in. That and the nightmares. Dino hated the screaming, he’d hit him to make him stop, but it only ever made things worse. So Ash learned. Learned to be quiet when he wanted to scream, and to moan when he wanted to cry. He shakes his head, still scared of knowing what Marvin did or did not do to him when he was out of it. He doesn’t ask what he wants,  _ how’s he supposed to ask Blanca if Marvin raped him before he got there? _ “Where’s Marvin?” He asks instead. Blanca simply laughs, 

“Probably buying a cast…” he says sweetly, “nothing you should concern yourself with.”

“Did he—?”

“No,” Blanca thankfully interrupts him, “he didn’t touch you.”

Ash feels less tense now, but a question lingers,

“Then why did you—?” he stops himself, he wants to press for more information, but thinks better of it, instead taking note of the car he’s in. “Where are you taking me?”

“To your house.” Blanca takes another turn.

“Dino’s in the hospital—”

“I know.” Blanca interrupts.

“Then how do you know where you’re going?”

“I saw the change of address, my little kitten, I’m happy for you.”

“I—” Ash is about to ask him how he knows that the change of address could possibly be a good thing, but Ash, for the life of him, can’t think of one bad thing about Max or Jessica. And even though Blanca couldn’t possibly know if what's happening is good, there's no point in getting in an argument over it. Especially when Ash knows he’ll lose. He looks back out the window, “Thanks for the ride.” He says. Blanca smiles, “You didn’t have to do this.”

“True,” he says, “but I wanted to.” 

“But why? There’s nothing I can do for you— No way I can pay you back.”

“There is one thing.” Blanca says, and Ash hates the way he tenses, and looks to his mentor with widened eyes. It’s silent, the car stops a moment. Blanca looks him right in the eyes, and says, with a serious expression on his face, “You could read Islands in the stream.” 

Ash pretends to stifle a laugh, Blanca pretends to pout.

He drives him home. If you could even call it that.

…

Ash would check his phone for the time, but it’s still dead at the bottom of his backpack, along with the granola bar, and the fifteen bucks Max gave him yesterday. 

He’s still worried about Marvin, somewhere in the pit of his stomach, because although Blanca chased him off today (the image of it makes him feel a little better) doesn’t mean the old fart’s not going to try it again, because Marvin is nothing but persistent when it comes to his  _ pets…  _

Ash is walking up the steps now. He thinks it might be some time between four-thirty and five, which would have been a correct assumption if he left the school immediately, but he didn’t. He doesn’t know how long he was wigging out for. So his anxiety is freaking him out. It’s telling him he’s gonna be late, they’re gonna get mad. He’s dead.  _ Kaput. Say goodbye to Ash Lynx.  _

Ash groans, rubbing his temples. He takes a deep breath before knocking, to the rhythm of a little tune he doesn’t know the name of. 

He hears some ruffling around inside before the lock clacks, and the door opens. He sees Jessica. She smiles, “Hey bud. How was school?” She gestures for him to walk in past her,

“Umm, good?” Ash tries his best to smile, and starts walking,

“That’s—” she stops, her face going neutral, she sniffs, before twisting in puzzlement. 

“Why do you smell like smoke?”

_ Crap.   
_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Panic attack. Homophobic slur. And Marvin. (Marvin deserves his own trigger warning tbh.)
> 
> So, my reasoning for Ash having a panic attack now, is that Marvin for him has always been somebody he is not allowed to say no to. In his mind it’s been reinforced that disobeying either Dino or Marvin ends in pain. So usually, even though he doesn’t want to, he’d have to go with Marvin. But now we add Max and Jessica to the equation. To Ash, they are sort of ‘in power over him’ they can hurt him if they want to, and to him, there’s no reason they shouldn’t hurt him. In his mind Max and Jessica are equal to Dino, it’s a wrong assessment, but when you go through trauma, your logic can get skewed. So right now he’s got two differing things he absolutely HAS to follow. He has to be “home” before 5, and he has to go with Marvin. Doing one, means he can’t do the other. So with the stress of two contradicting statements, he freaks. Blanca comes and helps Ash, giving Marvin a well deserved kick in the butt. (my inspiration for this chapter came from the Banana Fish Short story by Akimi Yoshida called ‘Private Opinion’. If you haven’t read it, you should it’s really good.) 
> 
> Also, this is officially the most I have ever written for one work. So yay me! (Most I’d written before this was around 16k continuously for an original work (by me) I call “the Burden of Your Enemy” (disregarding the other 54k (holy crap that's more than I thought it was) words I’ve written in a google doc basically explaining the whole plot of said work (A supposedly 60 chapter book (that I only have 1/6th done, in other words, the 16k I’ve written) of which I love and hate simultaneously.) Maybe I’ll post it, maybe not. Who am I kidding? Never. Never in a million years.) Why am I telling you this? You don’t want to hear this. (what is it with these notes? They make me feel like I need to divulge my deepest darkest secrets.) 
> 
> Anyways… 
> 
> You like the cliffhanger? I’m testing it out. Give me a rating out of five for how much you hate it. Lol I’m joking, please don’t.
> 
> +last thing I promise, if you see any typos, please please point them out to me. I’d much rather have one person point out an error, than many people pretend not to see it. It’s embarrassing to get things wrong, but I’ll never learn if you don’t show me where I messed up. So if you spot anything, please let me know. I really appreciate feedback. 
> 
> Oh my gosh these notes are getting progressively longer as this story progresses. Hope you like verbal diarrhea :)


	9. “Why do you smell like smoke?”

“Why do you smell like smoke?”

Ash stops in his tracks, _crap._

He’s standing at the front entrance, Jessica is giving him a _look._ She seems a little surprised. _Yeah well, took her long enough to realize how much of a hassle you are._ And this isn’t even his fault. _Not really._ He wants to bang his head into a wall, cause he can’t even tell her the truth. No way she’d believe him. He imagines how it’s go:

_‘Yeah, so, a guy came up to me after school and tried to rape me, oh! but don’t worry, it wasn’t the first time, see, I’m a slut who deserved it. Oh, but why the smoke smell? So here the thing, the guy’s always got a cancer stick glued to his hand,_ that is… _when he isn’t_ railing _me from behind, so the smell must’ve rubbed off on me from all that, make sense_ _? So disregard all the things you’ve heard about me, all the people calling me a delinquent and worthless waste of space and believe me when I say that I wasn’t underneath the bleachers smoking a pack of cigs with some goth kids.’_

Ash groans internally. _Sounds effing fantastic. Totally believable._ He refrains from digging his palms into his eyes. 

“Ash?” She questions. 

“I—” there’s no believable excuse. Nothing he could say that would make it seem as though he did nothing wrong. _How can you be so sure you didn’t have a part to play in this? What makes you so perfect?_

“Okay, maybe I didn’t specify,” Jessica cuts through his thoughts, “and that’s on me…” a pause for emphasis, “but we do _not_ smoke in this household.” Ash opens his mouth to protest. “And I could have let you go for that, blamed it on a miscommunication.” She gestures out with her hand, “ _If_ you hadn’t lied to me about meeting with a tutor after school.” 

“But I _did_ meet with a tutor.” It isn’t exactly the truth, but it isn’t a lie either. Jessica looks at him like she wants to believe him. _She shouldn’t._

“I’ll call the school and get this sorted out, just—” she sighs, “just hang out in your room for a bit okay?” Ash wants to argue it. _You’ve done enough arguing today you little slut._ Wants to talk her out of calling the school. _You’ve been selfish enough too._ Ash runs up the stairs, up to the room they’ve let him stay in so far. He’s in some deep crap. She’ll know there’s no tutoring program, she’ll know he lied to her. Stupid. Stupid. _Stupid._

He can’t think too hard about it, if he does the uncomfortable feeling in his chest won’t ever go away. He’s face first in the bed now. His thoughts running rampant. Nothing to distract him. 

He’s screwed up big time. 

…

Ash remembers the day he first met Blanca. To be honest there was nothing that really stood out about the man. Ash was fourteen years old, just trying to survive the day, living with the death of a girl who never got to truly live, and a will to die. His only semi-support system was in juvie, the place Ash was forced to leave not even a week ago.

His grades were bad. Which wasn’t by any means an unnatural occurrence. They were usually bad by choice, by _Dino’s_ choice. _He always liked it when his toys played dumb. That and all the good sob stories that came with taking in a poor, stupid, troublemaker, and giving them ‘the life they’d always dreamed of’._

But now he’s slipping. _Actually_ slipping. Not that anybody ever cared to know the difference. 

It was his first three weeks of highschool, and he was already failing. Dino didn’t like a smart-aleck, but having a dimwit was bad press, especially when nosy reporters ask how an amazing man like Dino Golzine could let his ‘mentally disabled son’ go without a tutor. 

This was why Dino offered a job to anyone who breathed, or sorry— any of his patrons that were willing to watch Ash for an hour, and get paid doing it. Ash didn’t learn anything then, he was a fourteen year old kid who no longer cared about life. Who gave no thought to the repercussions. 

Ash may have been done with the manipulating, Shorter's words hitting home, but he wanted them _off._ He fought it. _All of it._ With the same rage and determination as the child he once was. He punched and kicked, he bit, he drew blood. No tutor ever lasted a week. 

Until Dino hired Mr. Varishikov.

See, Dino never planned on employing an outsider. It was halfway through the school year when Ash’s english teacher asked him to stay after class. He did, sitting on his chair with anxiety crawling up throat. The man was big. In a way that Ash knew he couldn’t outmatch.

The man called him to his desk, and Ash couldn’t forget the way his last simmer of trust seemed to fade. School was supposed to be safe. It was supposed to be the place where he could hide from Dino and his friends. The place Ash could, for a small part of his miserable life, pretend to be a kid. 

Mr. Varishikov leaned over, and told Ash they needed to discuss his grades. Ash tensed at that. 

The events leading up to this felt scripted, like one of those pornos Dino would force him to watch, just to see his squirm. The ones where the student was failing, and sex was the only way for them to pass. 

Ash was ready to perform for the man. Because although he didn’t want to live, that didn’t mean he wanted to die. 

Maybe Ash wasn’t as good at picking up on flirting as he thought he was, but this man wasn’t laying down any hints. All he told Ash was that Mr. Golzine had been called, and was already on his way. Which was scary in its own right, but better than being late for Marvin. 

Dino glared at Ash every opportunity he could, when he finally showed up. To let him know that they were sitting in Mr. Varishikov’s office because of him. 

The two men talked, discussing the thirty percent average Ash held, which didn’t even include the zeros he was bound to have for all the stuff that was never marked. The things Ash never got the chance to turn in. Stained and wrinkled. 

It was halfway through the conversation when his teacher’s attitude changed. Even now, Ash isn’t so sure what it was, heaven only knows he didn’t even notice until months later. The man kept looking from Ash to Dino, with the look an english teacher might give to a book that has no real meaning. It felt like he was searching for something that just wasn’t there. Maybe it was the bond he was looking for, trying to understand if Dino ever actually cared for Ash. Trying to find an ounce of love in what he thought was supposed to be a family.

Mr. Varishikov didn’t know what was going on in Ash’s life, but he looked him in the eyes and told him he was open to tutoring.

Dino didn’t accept at first, until the man made an insinuation. A horrible one really, he said it in a way that made Dino laugh, and Ash’s stomach curl. Dino responded like Ash wasn’t in the room with them. Like Ash was nothing but his _plaything._

It was then that Dino trusted the man, as strange as it was, trusted him not to tell a soul about the things going on behind closed doors. Which was true. 

Mr. Varishikov never said a word.

Dino beat him when they got home, for interrupting his oh so important day. And although his gold ring stung, it was better than the pain and embarrassment of being raped by the man everyone wants you to call father.

Thursdays were the chosen days. And it made Ash worried then, that first Thursday morning, because he’d be stuck with the same man, every week, for an hour, in a place he was supposed to be safe.

It was grating on him. Every minute that passed brought him closer to the end of the week. Brought him closer to the end of the day. 

Not a word made it to his ears that Thursday morning. All he could do was stare at the clock. (If Shorter wasn’t still in juvie he would have asked Ash if he’d seen a ghost.)

Ash tracked the man with his eyes during english. Watched him move around the class. He spent his last few seconds of freedom wondering if he could somehow escape the classroom and live another day.

The window didn’t seem too thick. 

The bell rang. The kids left. Ash wasn’t ready. 

A book was dropped onto his desk. ‘ _The Ice Palace’_ by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Ash remembers looking up.

“What is this?” he asked, confused. 

“A book.” The man said, before sitting down at his desk, “you read it.”

‘I know that.” he paused, fingering through the pages, “but—” he stopped himself then. Too scared to question what was happening. He read. Not all that invested as he skimmed, wondering at what moment his teacher would take to strike. Ash didn’t put his glasses on, which made it harder to read, but Dino hated them, said they made him look ugly, who’s to say Mr. Varishikov wouldn’t either.

An hour passed. The man never said a word about sex.

Weeks passed. The man never made a move.

“Mr. Varishikov—?” he had begun to ask the day he finished the book. Standing awkwardly at the end of his teachers desk. 

“Blanca.” The man had smiled at him. “You can call me Blanca.”

…

Ash’s grades were still bad. _By choice,_ he’d remind anyone that knew. Blanca gave him english homework meant for professors by the time he was fifteen. And made a point in letting Ash know that he wasn’t as dumb as he looked. (Ash had glared at him for that one.)

Ash got bad grades, but that didn’t mean Blanca wasn’t pushing him. 

They came to a deal, sometime during grade nine, that Blanca would prepare two report cards, one with Ash’s actual grades (one he could use if he ever lived past eighteen, Blanca always said he’d make a good english professor), and the one that was so called ‘Dino Approved’. 

Blanca never asked questions, which Ash was thankful for. He gave him an hour, with no thoughts, or pain, and that was more than Ash would ever be able to repay. 

It was nice to think about all the hours spent in that classroom, reading. 

But it was gone now. And it was his fault. If he had just run. If he hadn’t argued. If he was just what _everybody_ wanted for _once_ in his screwed up life. 

Ash pressed the pillow deeper into his face. He had always been a Debbie Downer, but moping was just sad.

He ventured out of his room at one point, and although he didn’t know what the rules were around here, he had to use the bathroom. 

He didn’t mean to overhear what they were saying, honestly, but ears aren't exactly something you can shut.

“Well we know he lied to us.”

“We don’t know that.”

“Max, there isn’t a tutoring program at the school, or anywhere else for that matter.”

“There _are_ such things as private tutors,”

“I get that, I just—? I want to believe him, okay? Can you trust that I want to believe that?”

“I get what you’re saying but—” he stops, whispering something, 

“You think just because—” Ash doesn’t catch what they’re saying, _they’re calling you a delinquent. Maybe they know you’re a whore._ “—we can’t just let him off the hook—” _No you can’t,_ his mind quips at the words he can make out, he ignores it.

“—I know Griffin, and he wouldn’t do—” another silence.

“—well Ash isn’t Griffin, Max—!” He hears Jessica say in a louder whisper.

“You don’t you think I—?” he doesn’t hear the rest of what he says, _know that?_ His mind supplies, automatically filling in the blanks. 

“—we have to do something about it—” Ash moves closer to the steps unconsciously, trying to hear better. He doesn’t mean to, but his foot comes around the corner, right at the top of the steps, and now he can see Jessica’s back through the bars of the railing. Which doesn’t raise any alarms, but then he sees Max’s face. 

He thinks he’s stepped back quick enough, but Max sees him over Jessica’s shoulder. _Crap. Abort. Abort._ He starts to walk away,

“Hey, Ash!” Max calls out, Ash appears back around the corner, Max scratches his head, “I— uhh.” Ash almost doesn’t catch the way Jessica brushes past Max. Ash can’t see her face. Max lets out a short sigh. “uhh… why don’t you come down? Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.”

Ash stands there awkwardly for a second, “uh, sure.”

… 

Ash is sitting at the table now, Michael next to him, and Max and Jessica across from him. 

It’s tense. Jessica seems to be angry at Max for something. Max looks sheepish. And they’re all trying to pretend that Ash didn’t hear them talking about him.

They’re eating spaghetti, all using the excuse of eating for silence. 

Except for Michael who’s chattering about his day around a mouthful of noodles.

Ash is hungry, but he can’t bring himself to eat, moving the food around with his fork instead. 

Michael finishes first, leaving his plate at the table and running off to play some games. 

It is when Max and Jessica have finished their food, that she asks, not unkindly, if he’s done. Ash, who hasn’t eaten a bite says he is. The plates are brought into the kitchen, and then they sit there. Ash finds himself unsure of what to do with his hands, letting them rest by his sides. 

Jessica clears her throat, “Let me just get straight to the point,” she sounds a little unsure of herself for a moment, “you’re grounded.” Ash’s eyebrows knit together in confusion, 

“In what way?”

“No going to friends houses, no staying late after school, and you have to do some chores” she lists off, giving a half shrug when she isn’t sure what else to add. Ash is still looking at her with his forehead all scrunched. It’s still for a moment before Ash speaks out, 

“That’s it?” he says, a little louder than he means.

“What do you mean ‘that’s it?’” Jessica asks, and Ash wants to tell her, ‘ _I mean that Dino would’ve beat me, no less than I deserved, or he’d bring me to his room and tie me there for hours—‘_ Ash’s stops himself,

“Sorry— I didn’t mean anything by it.” Jessica opens her mouth like she’s planning to push it further, 

Max cuts in, “I was thinking that we could just go over the house rules, so that we don’t have a repeat of today?”

“Uh, okay.” Ash nods, _easier for me to avoid getting in trouble, took me years trying to work my way around Dino’s mind games._ Jessica nods too, though doesn’t speak for a moment, probably thinking of what to say,

“No smoking. No drinking,” she starts to list off, and Ash is desperately trying to come up with ways to hide the stench of Marvin if he ever wants to get handsy again, and knowing Marvin, _he will,_ “Usually we’d ask that if you were out with friends, to be home by 10, there would _also_ usually be exceptions to this, but you _are_ grounded so this rule doesn’t really apply…” she looks around for another thing to say, before her eyes widen, if he had to pinpoint a ‘eureka’ expression, this would be it, “No swearing.” Jessica emphasizes, “Michael dropped the F-bomb at school last year, there was a whole fiasco about it, a repeat is to be avoided at all costs.”

“—And it should go without saying,” Max adds in, “don’t do anything illegal.” Ash waits until he’s sure they’re done talking,

“Okay.”

“Okay?” Max looks around, then gives the thumbs up. 

“What do you want me to do right now?” Ash asks, “With the whole… “grounded” thing.”

“Do you have any homework?” Jessica suggests,

_No,_ he doesn’t, but he’d rather get out of their way and pretend he is. “Yeah, I should probably go do that.” 

He’s dismissed, so he gets up and treks his way up the stairs. _Maybe tomorrow will be better?_

Who’s he kidding? He’s Ash Lynx.

With his luck he’ll be dead in a month. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so up until this point I have had at least two chapters pre-written, but I don’t have the next chapter written yet, I’m working on it, but I’ve been pretty busy recently. So if I finish the chapter and I’m happy with it, I will definitely post next week, if not, then I’ll just post it the following week. 
> 
> Just wanted to give heads up :P
> 
> Edit: I just realized that I screwed up on the order of Ash’s classes, I was real confused for a bit there, so I just had to change a small detail in chapter 4 because of inconsistency. Basically Ash’s English class was right after lunch in chapter 4, and at the end of the day in chapter 7-8, so to make it consistent I changed it to be at the end of the day. 
> 
> The order of Ash’s classes now go:  
> Bio  
> (To be determined)  
> Lunch  
> (To be determined)  
> English  
> :)  
> The to be determined basically means I don’t know what he has for classes there, and I want to leave my options open if I ever figure out what to put there :P


	10. “Why’d you quit modeling?”

Ash doesn’t remember falling asleep. 

One moment he was thinking about how much of a screw up he was— (is), and the next his eyes were being pried open by the sound of movement outside his door. 

He remembers dreaming, but doesn’t have the faintest clue what it was about. 

Jessica knocks on his door, lightly at first. Ash stirs, sitting up as quick as he can. 

“I’m up.” He says, loud enough for her to hear. She doesn’t respond immediately, 

“School is in a half an hour, come down when you’re ready.”

Ash furiously rubs the sleep from his eyes, he’s still wearing the same clothes from the past few days. 

_I probably stink._ He thinks as he takes a moment to bend his neck down and smell himself. Confirming what he already knows, Ash wrinkles his nose, _I should probably take a shower at some point. The school showers might be open?_ He shudders, the idea of being caught makes his skin crawl. _I am_ not _doing that._

At least he brought an extra shirt, some deodorant, and a greenish-blue flannel. (Dino would be rolling in his grave, (if the man could just go and die already.)) He had always forced the ‘proper’ clothing onto Ash, but what was so wrong with a normal t-shirt? Why did everything always have to be so extravagant? 

Ash was never one for fashion, but he thinks he looks alright. Ignore the grease making his hair all shiny, and he’d be like any other teen. 

Scratch that. He’s seen his fair share of unbathed hooligans.

He gets away without having to scarf anything down for breakfast, never mind the way his stomach is pulsing right now, Ash was never one for eating in the morning. Maybe when he was a kid. Maybe when he was happy. But there’s just something about before ten in the morning that makes him want to puke at the idea of eating anything. 

That doesn’t _sound_ all that new considering he feels like throwing up at the idea of eating anything _any_ time of day recently, but breakfast has always held a special place in his gag reflex. 

Jessica hands him a granola bar, and a lunch before they go. (It’s like he’s starting a collection at the bottom of his bag.)

It’s quiet in the car, not necessarily uncomfortable though.

Ash actually does wave at Michael as he leaves, the kid waves back. Before running into the school when he spots, who Ash can only assume, is his friend. 

Ash catches the faintest smile at the edge of Jessica’s lips when he turns back around. It’s gone before he can really notice it. Replaced with something neutral.

She drops him off, nothing extraordinary. He thanks her, she smiles, driving off when he turns to go inside. 

…

Shorter is in the class when he gets there, pulling his sunglasses down his nose. 

“You aren’t answering my texts.” He starts when Ash sits down next to him, “I brushed it aside yesterday because I believed you when you said these people weren’t bad.”

“They aren’t.” Ash responds truthfully, _they’ve given him no reason to believe otherwise._ Shorter squints at him and hums. 

“Alrighty then. But that still doesn’t explain why you weren’t texting me back.”

“What are you? A mom?” Ash jokes, setting his backpack aside, “My phone’s still dead.”

“Ever heard of a charger?”

“Yeah. I don’t have one.” Ash explains, “I forgot it at Dino’s.” Shorter raises his eyebrows. 

“Well why didn’t you just say so?” He turns around in his seat then, to his backpack laying on the floor, and opens it. 

“What’re you doing?” Ash asks when he sees Shorter start to rummage, “Shorter, I’m not going to take your charger.”

“You are.”

“No, I'm not.”

“ _Yeah_ ,” he says, placing a cord into Ash’s hands, “ _you_ _are_.” He waggles his finger, “and this is _not_ up for debate.”

“So there’s no talking you out of this?”

“Nope.” 

Ash snaps his fingers, “drats.”

“Hey now! Think of it as you helping me out, kay? You charge your phone, I stop worrying. Sound good?” Ash wants to argue, instead he sighs and reaches into the bottom of his own bag, pressing the contents towards Shorter,

“Take it.”

“Ash, that charger was like a buck, I’m not gonna take— what…?“ he looks at the bills in his hand, “—fifteen dollars from you.”

“I was gonna use the money to buy a charger anyways, now you can get a nice one.” Shorter doesn’t say anything for a moment, and Ash thinks they might be at an agreement,

“Hold up, I think I’ve got change.”

“Oh my god, Shorter, are we really doing this right now?”

“Yes.” He says, pulling some crumpled loose leaf papers and a few coins from the bottom of his backpack. “Yes we are.”

…

Ash finds Shorter again after second block, where they eat lunch like always. Or— Shorter eats lunch, Ash is too busy stressing about Blanca now, he’s gonna have to tell him the bad news about tutoring. Or maybe it’s a good thing for him? Won’t have to deal with Ash’s crap anymore. 

He groans into his hands. He has no idea how it’ll go, and the pain in his stomach isn’t helping. Shorter notices his moody attitude almost immediately:

“What’s up?” 

“The ceiling.” Ash quips, Shorter raises his eyebrows like he’s still expecting an answer, Ash sighs, “I’m grounded.” Ash interrupts himself when he sees Shorter start to open his mouth, “—I’m fine though. I’m really, genuinely fine.” Shorter closes his mouth, listening, “I’m just grouchy cause I need to tell Blanca that Thursday’s after school are cancelled.”

“Why?” Shorter asks around his sandwich, “I thought you liked that nerdy stuff?”

“I resent that. But yes, I do. I just—” Ash struggles for words, bringing his arms up and resting his head down on the table,

“The people you’re staying with won’t let you go?”

Ash brings the hand under his head out and points at Shorter with a finger gun, “bingo.”

“That sucks.” He breathes, “Why?”

“Marvin showed up yesterday and I just—“ Ash groans into the table, “I don’t really want to talk about it.”

“Okay.”

“Thanks.” Ash whispers,

“No problem, buddy.”

…

_Why won’t the bell just ring already?_

It’s halfway through English and he’s still stressing about what to say. _Just talk to him. He’ll understand._

_No he won’t._

Eiji’s talking to him, or— he was. Ash was trying to listen, he swears he was. But every other second he’s thinking about Blanca. How much Blanca’s gonna hate him. 

He knows the older man wouldn’t hurt him, but— _just stop thinking about it. Thinking about it doesn’t help._

Eiji isn’t talking to him anymore. Probably picking up on some clue that Ash just— isn’t in the mood. _You annoy everyone. They’ll all leave eventually. Just—_

He just needs to talk to Blanca, but he isn’t sure how to bring it up. 

—He needs to apologize to Eiji. But the words aren’t coming to his mind. He wants to laugh it off, say something like ‘ _this is awkward_ ’ to break the tension, but his body won’t let him. _You’ll make things worse._ —Stop. _Just deal with it later. Right now you need to worry about Blanca._

_Blanca. What the hell do I tell him?_

_‘Okay so, you know the whole thing—’ Uhh no that sounds stupid. Maybe trouble? Uhh— debacle? Yeah, ‘You know the whole debacle with Marvin yesterday? Well I smelled like smoke and so, got in trouble.’ Is that enough information? Do I need to tell him more? ‘I got grounded and now we can’t do these tutoring sessions anymore. So I’m really sorry that I—’ no. No need to say that. Just-- think it up as you go. It’ll be fine._

The bell rings. _Crap. He’s not ready for this._

“Bye, Ash.” Eiji says, and Ash looks over at the boy giving him a smile. It isn’t... joyful, like usual. He looks concerned. _He should(n’t) be._

Eiji’s gone before he has the chance to say goodbye. 

Ash waits until everyone’s left the classroom before standing up and walking over to the older man's desk. 

Blanca notices him and takes his glasses off, “is something wrong?”

“No—! Uhh yes. It’s not—” Ash lets out a nervous and airy laugh, running a hand over his face to calm his nerves, “so I Uhh… I can’t do the tutoring thing on Thursday anymore.” 

Blanca scrunches his forehead, “why not?”

“There was— Marvin was smoking… the Uhh, the smell rubbed off on me.” Ash rubs at the back of his neck, “Max and Jessica thought I lied to them about the tutoring, which isn’t really wrong because I don’t really need tutoring, and what we do isn’t really…” he trails off, “so I’m— I guess I’m grounded now… which includes no staying after school on Thursday.” 

Blanca tilts his head, thinking for a moment, “Do you have their phone number? I could give them a call and get this sorted out.”

“I don’t know either of their numbers.” Ash lies through his teeth, _he spent a good half hour_ _last night memorizing Jessica’s number when he ran out of things to do._

If you asked him, Ash wouldn’t be able to tell you why he did it. Because he doesn’t know. And he also doesn’t fully know why he can’t just let Blanca talk to her. 

_You’re making it harder for everyone for your own selfish reasons. Just let it be, it’ll be easier for everyone. Blanca probably doesn’t even like spending time with you anyways._

“Do you want me to drop by instead?” Blanca suggests, “I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.”

Ash’s gut twists further. “No.” He breaths, hoping he said it out loud, “you don’t have to do that. I don’t—” Ash grasps for words, “I don’t want them to know about Marvin, and there’s no way to explain it _without_ bringing up Marvin— I just—” Blanca nods,

“Okay.” He says. Just like that. Ash is surprised he let it go that easy. _I guess I was right. He doesn’t care._

“So Uhh… I guess that’s it.” Ash stands there awkwardly for a good moment, 

“I guess so.” 

“I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

“See you tomorrow, Ash.”

...

Ash waits thoughtlessly by the front of the school when he sees Jessica pull up. He gets in the car. 

“Where’s Michael?” he asks when he looks back and sees the younger boy isn’t there, 

“Max picked him up from school.”

“Then why isn’t he picking me up?”

“ _We_ are going shopping.”

“Shopping? —I thought I was in trouble?” Jessica puts the gear into drive,

“Just because you’re in trouble doesn’t mean I’m going to make you wear the exact same clothes for _weeks_ . _Remember_ , me and Max _will_ have to live with the stink, so this is more for us than for you.”

“O-ok.”

…

They stop a few minutes later, _actually_ in front of a store. _Gonna have to get used to that._

It’s one of those smaller places, but it’s still got rows and rows of clothing. _This is gonna take a while._ Ash takes a deep breath. He always hated shopping, because it meant Dino was getting something new and exciting for his _pet._ Meant he’d be all over Ash for days. 

_Always gotta complain about something?_

Jessica and him begin looking at the right corner, she’s about to start sifting through the items in front of her when she stops, looking at Ash, “All we need is a few shirts and some pants, so we don’t have to be here for too long.” Ash nods, she gestures around the store, “Why don’t you help me look around? I have no idea what size you are.” _You and me both._

He starts searching along with her (with no intent of picking anything out), for only half a minute before she points for him to look, “What about this?” 

It’s a plain muted green t-shirt, “that works,” 

They continue looking for stuff when Jessica singles out some shirts on display, they have logos and quotes on them he doesn’t recognise. “Have you ever watched Star Wars?” she asks, picking up one of a yellow robot, 

“No,” he answers truthfully, “I haven’t watched many movies,”

Jessica shrugs and puts the shirt back, “that's okay,” she smiles mischievously, “Star Trek was better.”

Ash nods like he knows what that is.

“Well… what do you like to watch?” Jessica asks as they move onto the next section. 

_Watch? What_ do _I like to watch? The only thing Dino ever let me watch was those crappy pornos. But real movies?_ He’s never seen a full one. (Not since he was a kid, and even then, money was short, so Griffin didn’t take him often.) Sometimes Ash would sneak and watch from the corner of Dino’s living room if he ever happened to fall asleep. It was only ever snippets of scenes, and he could never find out what the movies were called.

Shorter offered to take him to a movie theatre a few times, but Ash was never allowed to ‘hang out’.

“I don’t really _watch_ anything.” He hopes she doesn’t notice the way he tenses, _disrespecting something she likes._

“Oh, do you like reading instead?” That… _surprises_ him, Dino always hates it when Ash got all ‘booky’, and Ash was always scared Dino would catch him with his glasses. 

“Yes…?” he answers, _is this a trick question?_

“Cool,” she smiles, “what books do you like to read?”

_What do I like?_ “Anything, really.”

“Well,” she says, grabbing a woman's shirt and draping it over her arm, “what’s your _favourite_ book?”

He thinks for a moment, “The Catcher in the Rye.” 

“I’ve never read it.” She says honestly, “but I think I’ll check it out.”

It’s quiet as they walk to the next section, “what about you?” he asks, returning the gesture. Jessica smiles softly,

“I like Stephen King”

… 

They talk. Slowly making their way through the store until they’ve acquired three shirts and a pair of pants for Ash, and two t-shirts for Jessica. (She tells Ash she hates shopping, yet anytime she goes she finds herself buying more than she means to.) 

“Why don’t you try your stuff on? Make sure they fit.” Ash nods and walks back to the changing rooms. Logically, he knows to lock the door behind him when he goes in. By all means, he _really_ wants to _._ But—

Dino likes to help him get dressed.

Naturally that means he makes Ash take off his clothes.

Naturally that means Dino has to touch him. _He’s only ever helping you._

Naturally the hands wander, but _god,_ does Ash hate it.

Sometimes he doesn’t stop at touching him. Sometimes Dino can’t wait until they get home, and Ash has to be quiet, but that always just turns Dino on more. It hurts, but it’s nowhere near the same feeling of walking out of that room. Having to pretend that his face isn't flushed. Like Dino didn’t just rape him in the middle of clothes store. Like Dino owns him everywhere. Like everywhere Ash goes is dirty. Ash is messing it all up. But his body flushes all the same. He doesn't _want_ to be flushed. He doesn’t _want_ his body to do the things it does. But it does. So that means he has to want it. _Doesn’t it?_

A knock. “Ash? Are you okay in there?”

He looks up, and sees his face in the mirror. It curls in disgust. A natural instinct by now.

Another knock, “Ash?”

He turns and opens the door, like nothing happened. _Nothing ever happened_. Jessica just raises her eyebrows and takes it all in a stride, “do the clothes fit?” she asks,

“Yep,” Ash smiles without teeth, avoiding her eyes, he hands her the clothes, “they all fit perfectly.”

…

Ash doesn’t really remember getting back out to the car. He just knows it was filled with him trying his best to avoid Jessica’s concerned gaze. 

She’s still looking at him. _Why’d I have to sit in the front?_

She opens her mouth a few times, like she wants to say something. It’s strange, especially with how unconcerned she always seems. _You did this._

“Are you hungry?” Ash startles, the quiet of the car being replaced by her voice, which seems a little less harsh than usual. (Not that she’s ever been mean. (Never mind every cell in Ash’s body telling him she should be _._ )) 

She takes Ash’s silence for a yes, and pulls into a parking lot area lined with different types of shops. “What would you like?” 

Ash merely shrugs. He just hopes that, whatever it is, he’ll be able to force it down. 

“How about that one?” she drives, pointing at a neon sign in the middle of a multitude of buildings. 

“Sure.”

…

It’s quiet as they sit at the booth. 

Ash is still shaky, but he’d rather eat, than waste the burger Jessica bought him. 

The place isn’t too busy. Every few minutes a person comes and goes, but he still feels like a million eyes are watching him. 

He doesn’t know why they didn’t just go through the drive through. 

The booth is an obnoxious red, and everything looks sticky. When he’s not chewing endlessly at a bite of bread and meat, he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. Jessica’s trying to act like she isn’t looking at him, but to be fair, he’s doing the same thing. He just can’t figure her out. He can’t figure _any_ of these people out. 

Ash is still sure that if he pinched himself he’d end up back at Dino’s. The idea sticks in his mind, but he’s too afraid to try. 

Jessica seems to have busied herself by looking up at the monitors hanging around the room. Searching for not too long, Ash finds one in his field of vision. 

The screen is playing some hockey game with two teams he doesn’t know the name of. If he listens hard enough he can hear the announcer guy talking over the bustle of the restaurant (diner, café? Whatever they call it). 

A few minutes in it cuts to commercial break, he takes that as a cue to take another bite of the burger in front of him. _Might as well make himself look busy._ When he looks back up it’s playing one of _those_ ads. 

He doesn’t get it, honestly. The thought of some prick jerking off to his pictures has always wigged him out. But at least his are illegal, hidden in the darkest parts of the internet, whereas these chicks have got themselves plastered all over the place, half dressed, posing for what is ‘supposed’ to be a commercial for a fast food place. He doesn’t get the appeal, but at least they wanted to do it. 

Didn’t he?

“Ugh.” the sound catches him off guard. Jessica is shaking her head in distaste.

“What is it?” he asks, genuine curiosity.

“The commercials they showed,” she laughs, pointing up to the tv, “I don’t get how they ever sell anything? They’re not even showing the product, It's all just some girls' tits.”

“Well I mean— it’s kind of obvious…” he says awkwardly, “Sex sells, doesn’t it?”

She laughs again, “Yeah, I get that. I was just thinking more in the hypothetical,” she gestures out, “like ‘why would any sensible person buy into this crap?’ it’s obviously just a marketing strategy.” she takes a bite from her food, “their milkshakes clearly don’t come with boobs attached.”

“Well, it’s a marketing strategy because it works, no? Or at least it used to work.”

Jessica nods in agreement, still chewing. 

He thinks back to all the times he’s done it. Every guys face when it happens. He’s heard it’s enjoyable, he’s _seen_ that it’s enjoyable. But—

“I just don't see the appeal.” he says, thinking out loud.

“In what?” she asks, swallowing.

“Sex.”

Jessica raises her eyebrows, mouth hidden behind a burger. “What do you mean?”

“I dunno— I just don’t think sex is as great as people make it out to be.”

“You’ve had sex before?” she speaks before she thinks.

Ash opens his mouth to answer. 

“Don’t answer that!” she interrupts, squeezing her eyes shut and shakes her head, “I’m talking out of my butt right now, that was a _very_ inappropriate thing to ask.”

_It was?_

“What I meant to say…” she starts, ignoring the previous subject, “Is that i get what you’re saying. Look, I used to work in the modeling business, on both sides of the camera, and I can tell you that they’re all a bunch of pigs.”

“I second that.” he snickers, Kippard always was a prick. 

“You used to model?” Jessica asks, surprised. 

_Oops. Don’t know when to shut your mouth, do you?_

“Something like that.” he responds, not meeting her eyes. Jessica tilts her head, he speaks up before she can think too much about it, “why’d you quit modeling?”

She takes a second longer than usual to register the question, when she does she faces towards the window, thinking. 

After a moment she looks back at Ash. “I guess it just wasn’t for me.” she smiles. Ash nods as they study each other. Jessica speaks up again, “so why did _you_ quit?”

_I didn’t._ He wants to say. _It was never my choice in the first place. But I do so well, don’t I? The only thing I’m good at. I’m just a pretty face, good for sucking dick. And that’s all I’ll ever be. A worthless waste of space—_

Not even a second has passed before he answers.

“Same reason as you.”

A moment later Jessica checks her watch, breaking the silence, “We should probably head back.”

He shrugs, “sounds good to me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Goodness this chapter was kinda all over the place, haha. 
> 
> Well, anyways, I got the inspiration to write this chapter from a nice person on YouTube called “pLanetstarBerry” (I wanted to have a chapter with Ash and Jessica going shopping, but had no ideas for where to go with it, so thanks to this person!)
> 
> (motivation is a nightmare (especially for this chapter) because it only ever comes once in a blue moon, and when it does I just HAVE to be at work so I can’t stop and write it down 😀)
> 
> Anyways… because Shorter doesn’t get much screen time in the anime, I kind of mixed his character with Sokka from Avatar: the last Airbender 😂
> 
> Edit: hope you guys don’t mind longer chapters :)


	11. “Why do kids have to be so forgiving?”

Not even a second after they step through the door does Jessica suggest Ash take a shower. 

He wants to pretend he’s affronted, but isn’t sure he’s ready to joke with her yet. He  _ wants  _ to believe everything they’re telling him is true. He honestly does. Something is holding him back though, and it’s frustrating as all hell. 

_ Such a weirdo. Haven’t even known them for a week.  _

He’s overthinking it again. 

Ash shakes his head and heads upstairs, he doesn’t make it the full way up before Jessica stops him, ushering him back. When he’s in front of her again she hands him the bag with his new clothes. 

“You can just leave the clothes you’re wearing outside the bathroom, that way I can get them washed. I’ll show you where the dirty clothes hamper is later.”

He nods, and continues upstairs. Hears the faint beginning of Max and her starting a conversation. He stops at (his?) room for some things. Deciding to bring his backpack into the bathroom with him. 

_ For safekeeping.  _

He peels his clothes off, being quick about placing them outside the bathroom door. Shutting and locking it within seconds. He’s careful not to look at himself in the mirror. 

He hates looking at his reflection. Hates the reminders that come with it. Of all the ways Dino—

Ash has very few scars, doesn’t mean it makes them any less painful. 

Rope burns around his neck, nicks on his wrists, from Dino’s little cuff fetish Ash was thankful didn’t last too long.

He tries not to look down at the hints of yellowish discolouration around his hips.  _ Was it really only a few days ago? _ It feels like forever, and  _ yet _ , like he was only just there, trapped under those covers. 

He really is pathetic isn’t he?  _ Just get in the damn shower.  _

It takes him a moment to get adjusted to the shower ‘controls’, but when he does he turns it just barely.  _ Don’t waste it. Hot water’s expensive.  _ That’s what Dino always told him. Why waste  _ all _ the delicacies on an ungrateful whore. 

_ But he doesn’t mind spending a normal man's monthly wage in fancy foods and clothing for a night out with me.  _

Ash snaps himself out of it,  _ just don’t think. For once in your life.  _

His shower is thoughtless. (He’s grown numb enough to his own insults to care anyways.)

…

The new clothes are a bit baggy, and the pants are a little high on his ankles.  _ Guess that’s karma for forgetting to try them on.  _ It’s nothing to worry about though. He’s always liked something that doesn’t show his frame off too much.

Like Jessica said, the clothes he left outside the door are gone now. And coincidentally, he thinks he can hear a washing machine. 

Somebody’s talking downstairs, and the voice is so familiar he just— it can’t be—

A twelve foot man is discussing the weather with his foster parents. 

_ What the hell is Blanca doing here? _

“Ah! Ash,” he smiles, hands politely behind his back, “it is good to see you.” he nods to the adults in front of him. “As we were just discussing, my horrible smoking habit seems to have gotten you in trouble.” He turns to Max and Jessica’s “I am deeply sorry about that, I’ve been trying to quit for  _ ages _ …” he gestures out like some melodramatic poet, “I understand if you want to get him tutoring from someone else—”

“Oh no, we couldn’t do that.” Jessica reassures,

“Are you sure?” Blanca is putting up that innocent charade, “I swear I’ll keep the smoking to a minimum.”

“To be honest, we're just glad he was telling us the truth.” Max jokes, “We’re so sorry for this whole mix-up.”

“Oh don’t worry about it. I would’ve done the  _ exact _ same thing in your shoes.”  _ holy crap, why does Blanca sound like such a mom?  _ “Well,” Blanca clasps his hands together, “it looks like we’ve gotten this situation cleared up… I think I should head out.” he points to the door behind him.

“Oh!” Jessica extends her hand, “Well, it was nice meeting you Mr…”

“Varishikov.” Blanca tips his hat. _Why is he wearing a fedora? What the hell—?_ He takes a moment to shake Max’s hand too. “I guess I’ll see myself out then.” he smiles, opening the door and walking out. Waving to Ash as he goes. Not a second after the door closes does Jessica turn his way,

“Ash,” she sighs, “we just wanted to apologize to you…”

Ash nods dumbly, “Sorry—” he gestures to the door, “If I could just.”  _ damn this is awkward. _

Max realizes what he’s asking. “Oh, of course!” Ash walks past him out the door.

He waits until it clicks closed.

“What the hell Blanca?” The man in question stops in his tracks, turning around.

“Sorry?” he asks tilting his head, “I didn’t quite hear you.”

“Why did you come here? When I  _ specifically _ told you  _ not  _ to?” Blanca’s face seems to fall. 

“I’m sorry,”

“—Why do you get to come here and invade my privacy _without_ telling me?” 

“Ah,” Blanca takes his hat off, holding it by his torso, “it seems I made an incorrect assessment, I apologize… I just thought me doing this would make you happy…”

“I—” _I_ _am. I am so happy. You don’t even know. I just don’t understand why you’d do this for me. I don’t deserve it. Wasting yourself for a screw-up._ “Just— _god,_ ” he mutters to himself, “nevermind… I’m sorry for getting mad…” _messing up everything._ “Thank you, Blanca, I really— really mean it. I’m...” Blanca’s face softens. 

(Ash usually hates it when adults look at him like this, because… because of things he’d rather not say… the point is, that Blanca looks at him differently. It makes no sense, but it does.)

“Anytime,” Blanca grins, stopping on the steps, “I’ll be seeing you after class on Thursday young man.” Ash rolls his eyes, smiling,

“Not like you don’t see me everyday.”

“Really? Could’ve sworn…” he trails off, hand on his chin. Then chuckles. “Bye, Ash.”

“Bye,  _ Mr. Varishikov _ .”

…

Ash removes the smile from his face before walking back through the door. A lie already at his lips. He starts talking before the door is fully opened. “Sorry about that, just needed to ask him about some english homework.”

Jessica nods her head, waits till Ash is facing her, “look Ash,” she starts, “I’m— we’re really sorry about not trusting you.” It makes his brain stop working for a second,

“You don’t have to apologize.” he brushes it off, “It’s fine, really.”

“No, it isn’t,” Max jumps in, “we should’ve given you more credit. You’re a good kid.”

Ash dismisses the words before he can really hear them.  _ They just don’t know the real you. _

None of them say anything after that, before Max coughs, awkwardly, “well, uhh, don’t know if we’ve told you already, but Michael’s got a baseball game tomorrow.” Ash nods, “We wanted you to come with us.”

“Uhh, sure.” he says, faking a smile.  _ There's no point in saying no, it’s just a kids game. It’s just— no point in thinking about it. It’s over. He’s long dead by now.  _

“What time is it?” Ash says, swallowing the lump building in his throat. Jessica checks her phone, 

“It starts at noon, so we’ll probably leave at quarter to.” she looks to Max for confirmation, 

“Yeah, so just make sure you’re up before then.”

“Sounds good.” 

…

He isn’t grounded anymore. Which is…  _ good?  _ Everything feels backwards here, wouldn’t be surprised if being grounded meant he was in the clear instead of the other way around. 

Maybe asking him to go play catch with Michael  _ was _ some form of punishment. Maybe they  _ knew _ how freaked out baseball gloves made him. 

He puts it on anyways, because what's the point in ruining a kids day just cause he’s got the heebie jeebie’s?

Ash has got a good arm, throwing the ball in Michael's direction isn’t too difficult, besides, the kids fast, and reasonably good at catching. He misses it half the time, but Ash doesn’t really care.  _ He’s still a child after all,  _ Ash doesn’t expect him to be the next all-star.

At the moment Michael seems to be chattering mindlessly about school. While Ash is fighting desperately to pay attention. To not to remember the way he’d look at his old baseball glove, the one Griff bought him, (the one he’d payed a weeks worth of money working at the grocery store for). It was laying on top of his clothes, that’d been torn off, thrown to the side. He was looking at it, staring intently. Trying desperately to forget where he was. Forget the weight pressing into his back. Forget about the way he couldn’t seem to get enough air,  _ never  _ got enough air. He remembers thinking so hard about Griff, playing catch in the field. Running around and playing the few days Griff had time for. And yet somehow, even with all the jobs, Griff always made time. He remembers thinking about it, because it was the only thing that could take him away from where he was. Make him forget, if only for a moment. 

The baseball slips out of his hand. 

“You don’t like baseball?”

And  _ that _ catches him off guard.  _ Perceptive little snot.  _ Okay— where’d  _ that _ thought come from? Michaels been nothing but an angel.  _ Stupid game of catch, throwing him all out of whack.  _

“That’s okay.” Michael smiles, shaking his glove off, “Mama told me that you don’t— that it isn’t as fun unless the person you play with is having fun too.”

And before Ash can deny any of it. The kid’s running up to the back door, shouting into the house, “Mama!”

Ash is walking up awkwardly behind him when he hears Jessica yell something back. 

Michael shouts again a moment later, “can we go to the park?!”

He catches the end of what she’s saying. “—just be safe.”

He assumes that means they’re going. 

It does. 

…

The park is only a block or so from Max and Jessica’s house, and Michael is skipping the whole way there. 

He misses the days when he was that carefree. 

“What’s your fav’rite colour?” the kid asks him. It’s a simple enough question. 

“I dunno.” he says, “blue, maybe.” Michael smiles at and turns around, skipping backwards. 

“Mines green!” 

“That’s nice.” and he means it. 

They’re at the park now, and Michael’s showing him how good he is at climbing the fireman’s pole. He gets up once, and tries for a second time, making it up halfway before he notices the money bars. 

“Watch this!” he says, stepping up the equipment, gripping the monkey bars with both hands and swinging. He gets his foot hooked around one of the bars in front of him for a second before it slips and he’s hanging from one bar again. He hops down, losing his grip. 

He tries again, but loses his grip quicker, doesn’t even get enough swinging momentum. 

He walks up to Ash after a few attempts, (or runs) stopping a foot away. Acting all shy. “Can you help me up?” Ash, stops swaying on his feet, walking towards the monkey bars. 

“Sure.” 

He’s a little awkward about grabbing the boy to lift him up. Hyper Aware of his hands at the kids torso, just below his armpits. Why does Ash have to be all creepy about it? His stupid screwed up brain. 

He shuts the thoughts out. Relishing in the look on the boys face when he makes it to the top of the monkey bars. Sitting with his legs hanging between the bars. 

“Come up!” He says, patting to the area beside him. And Ash would be a fool to refuse. 

It takes him a moment to get up to where Michael is. He’s not all that fit, but he’s by no means a slob either. 

He’s surprised that the kid’s just sitting there quietly. Weren’t children usually all over the place? All the ones he met were. 

“What do you like to do for fun?” Ash asks him, looking out at the sun. The sky is already turning red. 

“Hmm…” he swings his feet a little faster, thinking hard, “I like trucks!”

“Trucks?” Ash’s face softens, swinging his own feet, “What kind of trucks?”

“I like garbage trucks! And Uhh,” he fidgets for a moment, “and excavators! They’re really cool.” 

Ash nods his head, humming, “I think so too.” Never mind he isn’t exactly sure what an excavator is. 

Michael’s playing with a strand hanging from his clothes now, smiling. A second later his expression morphs, scrunching his eyebrows together exaggeratedly. The kid purses his lips. 

“Why don’t you like baseball?” he questions, “cus’ Daddy said you used to play when you were little!”

“Uhh,” he laughs nervously, words caught in his throat, “I did.” he admits, “but not anymore.”

“But why?” And a million different answers pop into his head at once:  _ Because my coach raped me. Because my dad didn’t do crap about it. Because Griff was gone. Because he was never coming back. Because I was the town whore. Because even though all the other kids didn’t know what it meant to be a prostitute, they knew it was funny. Because they parroted their parents each and every word. Because I had to go back to that man's house. Because I never slept a wink. Because I started wetting the bed again. Because I took my dad's gun and shot him through the heart. Because even though I cried, I was happy the man was dead. I was happy to be a murderer. _

“It doesn’t matter.” he says, a little harsher than he should. 

Michael doesn’t get the memo. 

“Yeah, but—”

“I said it  _ doesn’t matter. _ ” he snaps, and the kid shuts up. He can’t— do this. He can’t do the whole talking to kids thing. He’s too screwed up, and dirty and— and—  _ crap,  _ the kids frowning, looking away from Ash.  _ You’re making him cry you dick. Frick. Do something.  _ Do something. 

“I’m— I’m sorry. Michael.” he swallows, “I shouldn’t have said that. You were only curious.”

“I’m sorry for asking.” and his voice sounds so,  _ so,  _ small.  _ You did this.  _

“There’s nothing to be sorry for I—” he grasps for words, “I just don’t like baseball because—”  _ raperaperaperape,  _ “because somebody…  _ hurt me.  _ When I was younger.” he winces at his own wording. 

“Why would somebody wanna hurt you?” Michael asks. Like the innocent child he is.

“I Uhh,” Ash coughs, throat thick, “I don’t really know.”  _ But he does. Oh boy does he know. From all the dirty words that man whispered to him. All the words Ash could never forget.  _

“You’re nice, Ash” Michael smiles, “I’ll defeat anybody who hurts you!” he jumps down onto the rocks making up the floor of the playground, and runs around, making swooshing noises with his mouth. Demonstrating to Ash all the ways he’d defeat anyone who came against him. 

Ash doesn’t understand. 

_ Why do kids have to be so forgiving? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t really have anything to say...
> 
> I worked a lot on a chapter that you won’t read for another few weeks, aka: procrastinating writing this chapter, haha! 
> 
> Well, it all worked out on the end, finishing this up last night, and doing a read through this morning. :P
> 
> Also, I’m at a battle with myself in future chapters, trying *not* to add references to the outside world, like memes, current events, while also trying to remain accurate to American culture. I live in an American-like place, but I have to do a lot of research about things like the American school system to see if it’s as close to my country’s school system and other things like it. So yeah, not including movie references has been hard. Anyways... 😅
> 
> I’m kind of portraying (or trying to portray) Michael as a mix of a bunch of kids I’ve babysat for. Including one kid who was overly excited about trucks. :)


	12. “Are you threatening me?”

It’s Saturday. 

_Baseball_. 

A mantras playing in his head. Over and over like a broken record. _It’s just a game. It’s just a game. It’s just a game._

Logically he believes it, but for some reason his subconscious seems to hate him. (He can’t really blame it at this point.)

He woke up at five in the morning. Six or some hours before the game will begin. Four or some hours before Jessica will come to wake him up. And one minute before he jumps out of his skin. 

_It’s just a damn game. Stop being such a baby._

He ignores entirely how he woke up. Far too many mental images of his coach forcing its way into his mind. Making him refuse to close his eyes longer than a second.

Makes sitting in (his?) bed seem that much longer. Listening to the ticking of the clock in his room, annoyed at himself for noticing it in the first place. Keeping track of each time it ticks making his sleep deprived brain hurt all the more. 

_It’s just a game. It’s just a game._

He doesn’t really believe it. Because it’s all so much more than that. But if he can convince himself for even a second he’d keep saying it. Again, and again, and again. 

He isn’t reading, because turning on his light makes him feel like they’ll come barging in, asking why he’s up so early. 

So he sits. In the dark. Unreasonably annoyed at an inanimate object. 

_Charger._

He forgot about that. It’s in his bag somewhere in this room. 

Ash pulls the covers off of himself, shuffling in the dark. He barely avoids stubbing his toe on the end of the nightstand, as he finds the cool surface of the wall. Running his hand across it, he stops his hand when he feels the familiar shape of the light switch. 

He flicks the lights on for a second, pinpointing exactly where in the room his backpack is resting. Immediately turning the lights back off.

He stumbles into his bed, hitting his knee on the end. He curses, grabbing onto his leg. _Think idiot._ His backpack was somewhere around here… _Ah! There it is!_ He reaches down and pulls it up onto the bed next to him.

Unzipping it, he puts his hand in, feeling around for the rubber cord. It’s a moment later when he has it in his hands, charger head and all.

It takes him longer than it should to find an outlet, with all the flicking on and off of the lights. But he does eventually, tapping impatiently at the side of his phone waiting for it to turn on. 

It takes what feels like a half an hour to feel the buzzing of his phone come to life. It illuminates his face. 

The home screen is still set to the default wallpaper. (Maybe he’d have set it to a picture of him and Shorter. If he didn’t think Dino would ever use that as leverage against him. Besides, it’d be a bit weird for him to put Shorter as his lock screen, _right_?)

He shakes his head, and unlocks it. He’s got thirty-seven missed messages. 

_Huh._

He presses onto the screen, bringing up the series of texts.

  
  


__________Short Guy__________ 

  
  


1 week ago

Heyyyyyy

You sound like an idiot when you type like that

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

  
  


You blocked this contact. Tap to unblock. 

6 days ago

You unblocked this contact.

What have we learned?

Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!

Hmm

This block button looks very enticing...

wair

waot

I was joking

dont block mee

Im sorry

I’m tempted…

ლ｜＾Д＾ლ | heyyyyy

Im blocking you again 

凸(￣ヘ￣)

______________________________

  
  


Ash laughs at Shorter's antics, revelling in the lighter feeling in his chest. Somehow Shorter always knew the right (stupid) thing to say. It doesn’t last long, when he scrolls down to the messages he hasn’t read yet. 

_________37 new messages_________

4 days ago - 8:15

Yiu free to watch anime or sumthing?

Im bored

4 days ago - 8:21

Ashhh

Ashhhhhh

I summon you!

ノಠ益ಠノ彡

4 days ago - 8:26

Ash? Your worrying me.

I thought you said mr.dickface was going out tonite

4 days ago - 10:32

Ash?

It’s been 2 hours

Why aren’t you respinding

?

4 days ago - 11:04

Text me when you get these

If I dont see you at school tomorrow im breaking into your

house and stealing you

3 days ago - 3:29

Ash

Im sorry for what I said

3 days ago - 3:33

I understand that it isnt as easy as just telling someone whats going on

I want whats best for you

And I think that sometimes I express that in the wrong way

Anyways… Im sorry

3 days ago - 11:53

Goodnight Ash

2 days ago - 4:38

You better not have blocked me again you dolt

I want to see ur beautiful sarcastic text messages

2 days ago - 5:22

I know you said these people were fine and dandy

But your starting to freak me out 

Please just text me back as soon as you see this

Yesterday - 7:09

Okay you imbecile

I gave you a charger

Now you have no excuses

Yesterday - 7:58

Ashhhhhh

Im literally dying of boredom with no one to talk to

Yesterday - 8:13

Ash

I am literally breaking into your house tomorrow

I dont know where you live

But I have sources

And I am not afraid to use them

You’re All Caught Up

____________________________

  
  


_Frick. Only thought to text him back on your own time, right?_ That’s what this is, isn’t it? _Expecting Shorter to be available whenever you need him. And yet you can’t even do the same. Frick. Frick. Frick._

_I should text him? Right? He said he wanted me to text him._ Ash thinks, but there's an inkling in the back of his brain. _He doesn’t like you. Texting him would be a hindrance._

He _should_ just turn his phone off, just never respond. He argues himself. 

_I’ve always been fine texting him? Why the hell am I freaking out now?_ He starts to type, but everything he says sounds stupid. 

He hates himself for how selfish he is. For what he does next. 

__________Short Guy__________

Today - 6:17

  
  


Hi

___________________________

_Damn it. After this whole time of just ignoring him… that’s all you send?_

Logically he knows that it’s six in the morning. It’d probably be an hour or so before Shorter responds, but each second that passes is making him squirm more and more. 

Until he sees it. 

At just around 6:32, Shorter starts typing. 

__________Short Guy__________

Today - 6:17

Hi

Today - 6:33

Woah!

You’re alive!

____________________________

_Wait… what?_

__________Short Guy__________

Why are you up this early?

I could ask the same of you (͠≖ ͜ʖ͠≖)

Couldn’t sleep

what about you?

I woke up early to help Nadia out with some things at the chang dai 

You?

I just said I couldn’t sleep

You?

I’m giving you the dead look right now

Hey!

you scare dme for the past week 

i get to tease you a little

Today - 6:39

You know im right ;)

sure...

____________________________

  
  


Why was he ever scared in the first place? Of course Shorter would want Ash to text him. 

_He’s just being nice._

He shuts it out. _Apologize you freak._

__________Short Guy__________

Today - 6:42

Hey Shorter, I’m really sorry I never texted you back until now.

You did have me jumping out of my skin for a few days

But im sure you had your reasons

And i understand

Just dont do it again 

┬┴┬┴┤(･_├┬┴┬┴

____________________________

Ash laughs.

__________Short Guy__________

Are you threatening me?

…

Maybe…?

:)

Wow

____________________________

Ash doesn’t mention the baseball game. No point in making Shorter worry. 

He just has to suck it up and go to the game. Michael’s been an angel to him, Ash’d have to be a demon not to show up. 

It’s all in his head, after all. Just shut it out. _You always do. Why is this any different?_

He already broke one of his fundamental rules this week, he’s not breaking another. 

…

He pretends to be asleep when Jessica knocks on his door. Except it isn’t Jessica who knocks. Max’s deeper voice sounding from the other side of the wall. 

“Up and at em’!” Max calls. 

Ash thinks he responds with something comprehensible. Stumbling his way out from under the covers. 

Max is saying something dreadfully cheerful, but Ash’s head is doing a bit of swimming at the moment.

To put it lightly, Ash feels like someone swung a baseball bat to his head. _How ironic._

A wave of nausea hits him when he goes to take off his shirt. He has to sit down, breathing slowly. Like _that’ll_ stop the anxiety crawling up his throat. 

_This is all so stupid._ He thinks, running his hands through his hair. He takes a deep breath, steadying himself. This isn’t the first time he’s gone with less than four hours of sleep. _Not by a long shot._

_You can do this._ He says to himself, all of it going in one ear and out the other. 

_Objective: don’t ruin Michaels day._

…

“I remember Griff telling me about how much you loved baseball when you were a kid.” Max says on the drive to whatever kiddy baseball stadium they’re going to. 

“Yep,” Ash says, “we’d play catch all the time.” _Stick to the happier memories. Just don’t think about_ him. 

“I also remember him telling me you used to play on the kids team?” Max half asks, “he said you were really good.” _I was good. At least that’s what Coach always told me._

_But maybe he never meant baseball._

“Good is relative,” he says, trying desperately to keep the hostility out of his voice, “I was just a child, couldn’t have been better than Babe Ruth.” _or whatever his name was._ God, he knows nothing about baseball. The name only registering from what little he dares to remember about his childhood.

He remembers that baseball was the only thing, other than poetry, that Griff would talk about extensively. With passion, at least.

And his damn brain can’t remember a single word. 

But for some reason he can never forget that mans face. Can’t forget his black eyes, that stared at him with— no emotion— The charasmatic coach was gone. The man who would pat him on the back when he hit the ball well. The man who gave him treats, called him _son_ in the way his own father never did. All of that disappeared the second that door shut. All that was left were those eyes. Lifeless. Cold…

Max is still talking about baseball. 

Apparently Jessica took Michael to the kiddy stadium an hour before them, for practice, he thinks. 

Now he finds himself cursing, because he wishes Jessica were the one driving him instead of the doofus talking his ear off about baseball. It doesn’t help that Ash is trying _desperately_ to think of anything _but_ baseball. 

Jessica would talk to Ash, but it was in a more _reserved_ excitement. Whereas Max is just talking like he’s never heard of an ‘inside voice.’ Spouting the first thing that comes to mind. Ash’s talked to _kids_ with a better filter over their words. 

He hears Max talking about all these _positions_ , ‘shortstop’, ‘pinch hitter’, ‘closer’, and has no idea what the hell the man is saying. 

He’s spinning when they get there, parking in front of some middle school he doesn’t recognize. It looks nice enough, he sees a park, some benches. The school itself is pretty plain, it’s built with some kind of _orange_ rock? He didn’t even know they came in that colour. 

He doesn’t see Michael, but he definitely sees some kids running around a baseball field at the back of the school. Parents standing and talking. 

Ash’s got this pit in his stomach looking at it. He can’t pinpoint what’s giving him this feeling, but it’s there, and something in this place is causing it. He falls a bit behind Max, who’s strolling up to some guy Ash doesn’t know. 

“Hey, Ash!” He hollers, after sharing a few words with the man. He gestures big and wide for Ash to come over. “I want you to meet Laine,”

Ash nods his head, walking up to them, “hi.”

“Nice to meet you,” the man says back, putting his hand out to shake, Ash accepts it. Trying his best not to come off as uncomfortable. The man has a firm grip. 

“Laine, this is Ash,” Max clasps a hand to Ash’s back. Ash tenses, back going as straight as an arrow. He pulls a bit away from him, hoping Max’ll just _get his hand off._ “He’s gonna be staying with us for a bit.”

“Oh?” the Laine guy says, raising his eyebrows, “that great!” A smile spreads out on his cheeks. He’s got stubble and broad features, true epitome of a baseball fan. “Be careful Ash, Max is quite the troublemaker!”

The man’s looking at him, and Ash doesn’t know how to respond, half smiling. _That’s the right reaction, right?_ He doesn’t know how to act around _normal_ people. “Uhh,” he fakes a small chuckle, “yup.” _Why won’t Max get his hand off?_

Max rolls his eyes lightheartedly, “yeah, and Laine here is more so.” he laughs, “had to go and start his own baseball club because the school didn’t have one.”

Ash fakes that same chuckle again, “that’s cool.” _Get it off. Get it off._

“Yeah,” he agrees, “I’m the team's coach.” and he’s got this _big_ grin on his face.

“That great,” Ash says, giving the man a false smile, “and do you consider diddling kids as a hobby? Or do you get paid doing it?” 

The man's face falls, twisting in confusion. 

“I—” Laine starts, looking at Ash with a tilted head.

Max looks shocked. Muttering some apology, he grabs onto Ash by both shoulders, guiding him a few feet away. 

_Get them off. Get them off. Get them off._

“Woah, Ash! What the hell was that?” 

_Crap. Crap. Crap. It’s just a game. It’s just a game. It’s just a game._ But all he can feel are Max’s hands on his shoulders, 

_He brought you here, didn’t he? Aren’t you mad at him?_

“Ash?” he’s staring him in the eyes, Ash doesn’t really have an answer. “You are going to go apologize to him, or I’m taking you home.”

Ash laughs at the idea of home, he hasn’t had a home since the day Griff left. 

He wants to leave, but this day is about Michael, not Ash.

“I’m sorry.” he says to Max, but it isn’t an apology _to_ Max. _Not really_.

He sighs, “we’ll talk about this when we get home,”

...

“I’m sorry about what I said.” was then heard by the baseball fanatic. Who awkwardly said it was fine. 

_Just keep your mouth shut. Don’t let them catch on. This is about Michael. Not about some silly illogical fear of a kids game._

Ash can’t look any of them in the eye. 

...

Max spots Jessica on some low budget bleachers, standing and waving. Which is quite redundant considering there's barely any people there. 

“What’s the matter?” Jessica asks Max just before the game starts. All the kids grouped in one big circle, calling out some practiced chant. 

“It's nothing,” he says, “I’ll tell you later.” _And_ _frick. It’s obvious he’s talking about me._

Looking over, Michael’s standing somewhere in the middle of the line of batters. (Ha! Guess he _did_ remember something about baseball.)

...

Twenty minutes into the game, Ash’s heart is _still_ thumping, and he _still_ doesn’t understand the hype behind the dumb game. 

He doesn’t get, with all the people watching, how nobody noticed the pain he was in. He’s sure he showed up to many of them, limping like a dog from the pound. 

_Did you forget? They all knew._

_Nobody cared._

Max’s face goes from whatever look he has now, to one of a proud father when he sees Michael step up to the plate. 

“Wooh! Go Michael!” Max and Jessica yell shamelessly, camera out, the kid in question turns at the noise, smiling bigger than Ash has ever seen him, waving erratically. 

He comes to himself a second later, getting into a ‘ready’ stance. (Bat comically big for the child carrying it.) Ash doesn’t think he’ll hit the ball first try, but he does. Watching as it rolls along the ground past the pitcher.

Michael runs, just as gracefully as you’d expect from an eight year old. Making it to first base without too much trouble. 

Another kid gets a strike, before bunting it the second time. Michael makes it to second base.

Third hit gets out in seconds. Michael stays on second base. 

Fourth hit though, is gone down the field, some poor kid chasing after it, fumble after fumble.

Michael almost makes it home, tripping over his own feet. Falling on his face. 

Ash’s already uneasy stomach involuntarily drops at the sight. His legs forcing him to stand.

He hates himself for the way his gut clenches further at the sight of all these people getting up to see if Michael’s alright. He _shouldn’t_ be jealous. He’s worried for Michael too, _isn’t he_ ? But it’s all about Ash. And Ash can’t help but feel sick when he sees these people worried for a kid he’s not even sure they all know. But of course, it’s Michael. Michael’s _innocent_. He’s _naive_. He’s an _angel_ of a kid. 

Ash was the town whore. 

The coach is next to Michael now, helping him up. Ash almost feels better, at the sight of Michael okay, but the coach has got his hands on Michael’s shoulders. Handling him. 

_Laine looks like a good man. He looks like a good man._

Ash feels like he’s gonna throw up. 

Nobody notices him leave anyways. 

…

He’s still coughing a moment after, the contents of his stomach decorating the bottom of the school trash can. Not that there was much left in him anyways. ( _Ha! How poetic?_ He’s always been empty hasn’t he?)

He’s too tired to react to the footsteps approaching him. 

“Ash?”

“I’m fine.” An automatic response at this point. 

“What are you doing over here?” the words are gentle, but his thoughts are so jumbled he can’t help but feel like he’s screwed up somehow. 

“I’m sorry. This is Michael’s game i’ll—”

“No,” the word is harsh, but he doesn’t feel threatened, “if you’re feeling sick we should—” that same hand from moments earlier rests down on his shoulder that’s hunched over the trash. 

Ash flinches. 

He’s standing straight now, ridged as a wounded tiger. And he can see Max, both hands up. 

“We should go back home.” 

_No._

“I’m _not_ ruining Michael’s game.”

A hand reaches out, “He’ll have others. If you’re not feeling well—”

“I _said_ I was _fine_.” 

A laugh, “Well obviously not.” he gestures to the bin, exasperated. “Hop in the car, we’re leaving.”

Where? he doesn’t ask. 

He wonders which hotel. 

_Frick. Why the hell’s his mind always gotta go there?_

He said they were going h̶o̶m̶e̶. 

He doesn’t have the energy to fight it anymore. 

“Okay.”

…

The road is bumpy. But Ash enjoys the way his head bumps lightly against the windows glass. Reminding him that he’s still here. That he’s still alive _._

“When I first got back from Iraq I was in bad shape.” Max starts out of nowhere, knuckles white around the steering wheel, “I’d flinch at anything even remotely loud. Find myself having a panic attack any time there was a thunderstorm.” Ash sits up, adjusting himself in the far too warm seat. 

“What’d you do?” Ash asks with a strained voice. Pure curiosity taking over his need to stay silent. 

Max raises his eyebrows, let’s out a bitter laugh. “One day I was so sick of it. Sick of being freaked out all the time _._ So I went to a shooting range.” He laughs again, “ _dumb_ right? Thought I could face it head on. Say screw it to the demons. It was my life, I wasn’t gonna let some silly fear get the better of me.”

No words leave anyone’s lips for a second or two. 

“...What happened?”

A smile, “I didn’t even make it in the building before blacking out. I kept going though. Thought—” he gestures out with his hand, “—if I can just _stand_ inside that room without thinking of that god awful war... Then I could face _anything_ .” he pauses, scratching his neck, “Two months I went there every week… I was hurting myself more than I was helping I think. Having nightmares every night... _Thankfully_ this was before I met Jessica…” he smiles again, “she would have kicked me out for making such a racket... That woman could get rid of my doubts and fears in a heartbeat.” 

Ash interrupts the nostalgic looks across Max’s face, hates himself a little for it, “Did you stop going?”

“Hmm?”

“To the shooting range?” Max hums again, running a hand through his hair. 

“I wanted to.” he says honestly. 

“Then why didn’t you?” Ash starts, “you said it yourself, you were hurting yourself more than you were helping.”

“Yeah… but whenever I thought of an alternative, all I could see was myself giving up. Sitting in my room with earplugs in, hiding under the covers until I starved to death.” He shakes his head, “Until _one_ day… one day I went in. I _actually_ went in, nobody was shooting at the time, _of course_ ... I was the only person there at the moment… I signed up... went into the booth. I put those headphones on and I… I shot a gun. And somehow I realized that— that it wasn’t the gun dictating what was going on. It was the person. I realized that… I dunno— it doesn’t make much sense. But I realized that I was the one in control. I mean—” he puts his hand out, “don’t get me wrong— I still got _severely_ freaked out by loud noises. I still _do_ sometimes…. But every now and then, I’ll go to the shooting range, any time that I’m stressed. It calms me down, helps remind me that I’m in control. That I’m not in danger anymore…” he laughs, “It’s kind of stupid—“

“It’s not stupid.” Ash says it without thought, because he means it. 

“Whatever you say kid.” He turns back to the road. “The point is… that I get it.”

“Get what?”

“Whatever you’re going through. I get that you have this _need_ to be ‘hunky dory’ all the time.” he turns over to Ash for a moment, eyes on his, “I just wanted to let you know that me and Jessica— we’re not against you.”

“What makes you think I believe you’re against me?”

He shrugs, “Call it a hunch.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just wanted to point out that I do NOT condone Max’s coping strategy. I added it because I assume that’s how a man like him would react to feeling helpless. Just push through it all in one day when, obviously, it’s much harder than that.
> 
> I’m not as happy with this chapter as I should be, considering this is the first major plot point. 😅 (aka: why this chapter was a little longer than usual)
> 
> I literally got 1k words knocked out last night because I didn’t want to be late for the deadline that I set for myself. (Don’t worry, this isn’t so much about any pressure from you guys, but just me wanting to be more consistent with my motivation. So that I don’t get trapped in the cycle of writing nonstop for a week, and then forgetting about it for months.)
> 
> On a different note, I’m hooked on the video game Your Turn To Die, which is also one of the reasons I almost didn’t get this chapter finished in time, haha. (Joe is best boy. Keiji is best man. Indisputable.)
> 
> Oh my gosh, formatting for this chapter was a nightmare, and to think I've set myself up for many more conversations via text 😰
> 
> Thank you for reading my verbal diarrhea, it is greatly appreciated :)


	13. “How did he not notice sooner?”

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Max Interlude II

__________Jess__________

Today - 1:57

Hey, I left a few minutes ago. 

Ash wasn’t feeling well.

Today - 2:13

Just had him lay down in his room when we got here.

I need to talk to you when you get home. 

Today - 2:15

K.  
The game should be over in a half an hour. 

How’s Michael?

Good. 

Just had a little stumble.

Nothing to worry about. 

Ok. 

See you soon. 

Love you.

Love you.

__________________________

Max sighs. He has no idea what’s going on with Ash. 

The way the kid was acting today; maybe he can just hash it down to him feeling sick. Maybe it’s nothing to read into. 

But he can’t get those words Ash said to the coach out of his head. 

_ “Do you consider diddling kids a hobby? Or do you get paid doing it?”  _

It sounds like an insult any other teenager would throw around, calling a guy he’s never met some kind of pervert. He knows first hand how cruel older teens can be, (pictures of Dawson swimming in his head, of a mentally destroyed teenager who killed three other men before himself…) but— something is clawing at Max’s gut about all of this. He can’t let the thought go. 

He needs to talk with Jess, she was always the more practical one. 

_ A half an hour.  _ Max just needs find something to do during that time. 

Looking around, he racks his brain. Watching TV at this point just feels like a waste of time. 

He walks to the kitchen, mindlessly opening the fridge. Looking at all the food cluttering up the place, as one thought pops into his head, unannounced:

_ Ash is thin.  _

Something he couldn’t help but notice when he saw the kid at the back of the school earlier today. The first time he’d really noticed it. 

Ash was always wearing that same jean jacket, the one that came all the way down to his wrists. But today he was wearing a plain white short sleeved shirt. Something that left no room for imagining how skinny he was. He looked like a clothes hanger under it. How did he not notice sooner?

Max walks out past the kitchen, staring through the bars at the top of the stairs.  _ Is he hungry right now?  _ He thinks,  _ of course he is. He threw up recently. His stomach is probably empty.  _

Max isn’t one for culinary arts. But despite what he constantly says, he knows how to make  _ some  _ foods. 

_ His own special recipe in fact.  _

Slamming a package of Kraft Dinner on the counter, Max smirks to himself. 

Cooking, for Max, has always been an adventure. 

For one, the stupid cardboard won’t open, and his fingers are too stubby to get a good grip under what he’s pulled up from the tab. His nails are too short as well, picking at the end of the box, he almost gives himself a cardboard cut, and if  _ those  _ don’t hurt like hell, then he doesn’t know what does. 

A good two minutes later, he prides himself in his ability to open it without scissors. (Or if he did then no one will have to know.)

He pours the noodles into a Tupperware container, along with some water. Pushing it into the confines of the microwave. 

He pulls the plastic bowl out eight minutes later, methodically stirring the premade cheese packet into the pasta.

He’s embarrassed that he has to put his glasses on to read the words on the side of the cardboard. Squinting to see how much milk he needs to add, despite having made the same meal thousands of times before. 

Reading ‘one tablespoon of butter’ Max grabs the necessary utensil from the drawer and shrugs. He takes a moment to mourn the poor stick of butter, before mercilessly stabbing a spoon into its side. 

Approximately eleven or so minutes after pulling the Mac n’ Cheese from the depths of the pantry, is it ready to be served. 

So with a warm bowl in his hands he marches his way up the stairs, knocking gently at Ash’s door. Opening it when the kid doesn’t respond. 

“Hey Ash, I brought you some—” he stops himself when he sees Ash sleeping, curled up on the bed. 

Max smiles to himself at the sight. The kid looks calm. Which he’s surprised to say is an expression he’s never seen Ash wear. 

The kids eyebrows aren’t downturned like usual. Almost always in a scrutinizing or contemplative state. 

He looks…  _ at peace _ . And somehow that makes Max happier to see than all those smiles he’s witnessed. 

_ We’re they even real smiles?  _ His mind tries to supply, but there’s not a doubt in his mind that they were. What kind of kid knows how to put up that kind of show all the time?

Max shakes his head. 

It’s nice. Seeing Ash this way. He wishes he could see it more often. 

Max gently places the bowl on the nightstand next to Ash’s bed, in case the kid gets hungry when he wakes up. 

Taking one last glance at Ash’s sleeping form, Max leaves, with a pleasant smile in his eyes. For getting to witness what he did, if only for a moment. 

…

He hears the front door open a few minutes later, while he’s sitting on the couch, reading the newspaper to catch up on current events. 

Michael comes bolting towards him, and Max barely has enough time to toss the paper to the side before his kid barrels into him, knocking the air out of his lungs. He gives Michael a great big hug in return,

“How was the game, buddy?”

“Awesome!” He shouts,

Jess appears around the corner a second later with a smile on her face.

“Hey Michael,” she says, leaning against the doorway, “why don’t you tell your dad about that cool thing that happened?” Which makes Michael start to bounce on the balls of his feet, acting all giddy. 

“What happened?” Max asks, excited. 

With such prompting, Michael then grins a big and toothy grin, or— a  _ less  _ toothy grin. He pulls a small bag from his pocket, with a small white thing in it, holding it up for his dad to see. “I lost a tooth!”

Max squints at the item inside the bag for a moment, before smiling, “That’s awesome, kiddo!” Max says, taking the bag in his hands to get a closer look at the tooth inside, 

“It popped out when he fell over,” Jessica raising her eyebrows, “crazy right?” 

Mac laughs, “crazy indeed,” he hands the bag back to Michael and points to the stairs, “why don’t you go to your room and put it under your pillow? I’m sure the tooth fairy will be paying a visit tonight.” At that, Michael smiles bigger and begins running off upstairs, “—oh! Try to be quiet too, Ash is sleeping.”

“Okay daddy!” he whispers, exaggeratedly sneaking up the stairs. 

Max turns to Jessica as soon as Michael is fully up the stairs. 

“Jess—”

“Max—”

They laugh like one would at an older joke, having spoken at the same time. 

“Uhh,” Jess starts, clearing her throat, “what happened with Ash? Is he okay?”

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

She looks around, “he’s still sleeping?”

“Yeah” Max says getting up, “out cold. Fell asleep as soon as he went upstairs.”

Jessica nods, taking a moment before she speaks again, “What happened back there at the school?” She asks, “one moment you were there, the next I look over and you’re gone.” Jess folds her arms, “good thing we had an extra car.”

“Yeah…” Max rubs his forehead, “Ash wasn’t feeling good. He threw up in a trash can at the back of the school.”

_ He called Laine— he called the kids coach a pervert,  _ he should say. But he knows that Ash is a good kid. It’s be stupid to beat a dead horse with a stick. Max isn’t some kind of tattletale. 

But he still can’t let the thought go.

_ Why, though? _

“Do you think he’s doing better now?” She asks. He doesn’t even have to think. 

“Honestly?” Max says. Jess hums in response, “I don’t think so.”

She seems to take that thought for a long ride, because she’s standing there wondering for a minute or two, “He said he used to be a model?” She says, not quite sure of herself. “He let it slip while we were shopping for clothes yesterday… I don’t know if that correlates with anything.”

Max rubs the thin stubble on his chin. “I don’t know.” He sighs. “This is all so confusing…”

“Agreed.” She says, “I don’t want to— I dunno— I just don’t want to screw up his life? Screw him over? However you say it.” Max nods,

“We’ll figure out what’s going on, we just need to keep a close eye on him for now. No point in jumping to any conclusions.” Jess hums in agreement, then opens her mouth as if to say more,

but Michael comes running down the stairs. 

“You hungry?” she says instead, the question directed at the kid in the room. 

Max points to the kitchen, “I made some Mac n’ Cheese for Ash earlier, if Michael wants any just make sure to nuke it in the microwave beforehand, it’s definitely cold by now.”

Michael’s ears perk up at the mention of Kraft Dinner, nodding his head enthusiastically. Jessica gives Max a look as if to say, ‘did you seriously just volun-tell me to get Michael’s dinner prepared?’ Max laughs at the idea, standing from the couch, following Michael into the kitchen, “Okay kiddo, I’ll get it out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So.... sorry this is much shorter than usual 😅
> 
> I swear the next chapter will be much longer! (This chapter was just needed to connect the last chapter with the next one.)
> 
> Also, I’ve made way too much Mac n’ cheese recently XD that’s probably why it was the first food I thought of. 
> 
> \+ I’ve got another idea for a fanfic, but like— I have to keep telling myself to finish this one first!
> 
> Happy Valentine’s Day! (Don’t worry, I’m single too) XD


	14. “You saying you don’t trust me?”

It’s sometime past midnight when Ash hears a little plinking noise. 

He opens his eyes, and sits up, disturbed. 

The noise, as it turns out, is coming from his window. Looks like someone’s throwing little rock’s at it. 

_ What the—? _

He opens it up to take a look when one hits him right in the head, Ash hisses, “fff—” he leans over, and squints out the window, “—Shorter? What the hell are you doing here?”

The teen below startles, dropping a few pebbles from his hand, but smiles when he sees Ash’s face. 

“What? You telling me a stranger throwing pebbles up at your window isn’t romantic?” He yells back.

“Romantic? Shorter, it’s two in the morning. _Why_ _are_ _you_ _here_?”

“Straight to the point are we? You know Ash, if you were a woman I might have considered dating you.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Ash mumbles, sleep clawing at his eyes, “Can we  _ not _ talk about this right now?”

Shorter lifts a leg and steps onto the flower box, many feet below Ash’s window, applying little pressure to the wooden structure, testing out it’s strength, “no.”

“‘No?’  _ Shorter.  _ It is.  _ Two. In. The. Morning. _ ” He emphasizes, lightly hitting the window sill with his palm, “What is  _ wrong _ with you?”

Shorter ignores Ash, and looks at the window, sizing up the height of the wall in front of him, “I’m gonna climb it.”

“Shorter. Are you listening to me? You are  _ not _ coming up.”

“I’m coming up.”

Ash groans, loud enough for Shorter to hear, pulling at his hair, “does nobody listen to me around here?”

“Nope.” Shorter grunts, gripping onto the ledge of a window down below. 

“That was rhetorical.” Ash grits, leaning fully out of the house now, some feet above Shorter. 

“Didn’t sound like it.” 

...

After a few minutes of watching him struggle Ash speaks up again. “I’m gonna be a grandpa by the time you get up here.”

“This is harder than it looks, you know! Those chick-flicks are liars!” Ash rolls his eyes,

“You know you’ve done this before?  _ Multiple times. _ ”

“Yeah, well, this house doesn’t exactly have any foot holds.” Ash sighs and reaches his hand out. Shorter looks at him, surprised.

Ash feigns annoyance, “Are you gonna take it or what?”

Shorter pretends to puff up his chest, as best he can in the awkward spot he’s in, “How do I know you won’t let go and watch me fall to my death?”

“Seriously?” Ash gives his hand a little shake, giving Shorter the go ahead to take it, “this position isn’t easy to hold!”

“You promise?” He says, in relation to his first question. 

Ash rolls his eyes again, “I promise I won’t drop you.”

“No good, I’ve known too many Spaniards.”

Ash pulls his hand away and literally  _ does _ bang his head into the wall coming back up, “Can you  _ for once _ stop making those dumb movie references?” he says, rubbing the back of his neck, “ _ especially  _ to movies I haven’t seen.” Shorter tilts his head to the side, 

“Nope.” 

Ash curses, shaking his head, “Just take my hand you dolt.” Shorter smiles, reaches up and takes Ash’s arm. After a few seconds of struggling to get him up and over the window sill, (“why are you so fat?” “I can’t help that Nadia is such an amazing cook.”) they’re finally sitting on the floor of (Ash’s?) room. Shorter is basically panting. 

“Damn, you’re out of shape.” Ash breaths,

Shorter chuckles, “Says the toothpick.” 

“Sure.” Ash rolls his eyes, yet again, “what are you even doing here?”

“Oh yeah!” Shorter raises his head, “Can you lift up your shirt?” he says, like it makes logical sense, and points to the hem of his shirt. Ash moves away and looks at him, baffled. Then brings his hands up between them, 

“Woah, woah, woah…  _ what? _ ”

“Lift up your shirt.” 

“Don’t get ahead of yourself there buddy. We are in an area—“ Ash gestures around them, “—called the friend-zone. And this is a  _ major  _ violation of personal space.” Shorter furrows his brow, looks at Ash like he’s gone mad. 

“What?” His nose scrunches, he moves away from Ash “No. That is—“ a laugh, “that is just—“ a cough, “no.” he shakes his head for extra confirmation, “ _ No. _ ”

“Then  _ what _ the  _ hell _ are you doing?”

“Injuries.” Shorter says, “I wanted to check for injuries.”

“Why would I be—?” Ash begins, Shorter interrupts, 

“—okay, I’m sorry,” he says, a little frantically, “you said you were grounded— and I was scared because you’ve only lived with these people for a few days, and— you aren’t allowed to go to tutoring class—  _ whatever you call it  _ —with Mr. Varishikov anymore? What kind of reasonable person does that Ash? Takes a kid out of an activity that helps them?”

“You know Blanca isn’t tutoring me, right?”

“I know that, but  _ they _ don’t.”

“I said I was fine.”

“You’ve said a lot of things before. I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

“You saying you don’t trust me?”

“I trust you.” Shorter says, looking him right in the eyes, “What I  _ don’t _ trust in, is your ability to tell me when something is wrong.”

Ash swipes a hand over his face, “ _ Shorter, _ ” he sighs, “it’s  _ two  _ in the morning, does Nadia even  _ know  _ you’re here?”

“This was mostly her idea.” Shorter starts, tilting his head to the side, “...minus the going in the middle of the night.”

“Oh? So now you’re  _ all _ against me?” Ash jokes, then pauses at the absurdity, “ _ how  _ do you even _ know where I live? _ ”

“I have  _ sources. _ ” Shorter explains, “but that is besides the point.” 

“And the point is?”

“That I care about you.” He brings his hands together like he’s pleading, “Just humour me?”

It’s quiet a moment, Ash sighs, and lifts his shirt up. The act doesn’t make him uncomfortable, he knows Shorter wouldn’t hurt him, from all the times he’s had the opportunity to before. 

Besides, if it stops Shorter from worrying, he’d do anything. 

Shorter examines him for a moment, hand on his chin, he takes mental note of the marks he’s already seen: the scratches down by Ash’s hips, up at his shoulder blades, where he can’t tell if they’re from fingernails or belts, he doesn’t know which one he wishes they were. 

Looking at the bite marks littering Ash’s pale skin, Shorter’s angry at himself for getting used to the sight of them. Wincing at the yellow tinge just above his waistband. Shorter makes sure he doesn’t spot anything recent before nodding. “Looks like you’re alright.” Ash pulls his shirt back down. 

“What a surprise.”

...

They chatter for a bit. Splitting the bowl of Mac n’ Cheese that mysteriously appeared at his bedside table. Before Ash announces that it’s time for Shorter to leave, because both of them need to be up for their respective responsibilities in a few hours. 

Shorter suggests he leaves out the front door. Ash just shakes his head and points to the window. 

Shorter whines at the idea of having to climb back down, but Ash is  _ not  _ getting in trouble again.  _ And,  _ Shorter needs to learn that showing up to the house Ash is staying in, in the middle of the night will  _ not _ be tolerated any longer.

“But look at how high it is!”

Ash huffs, “Well, you should have thought about that before you climbed it.”

Shorter groans, taking the opportunity to fall face first into (Ash’s?) bed.

“ _ Shorter. _ ” Ash says, crossing his arms. 

“ _ Ash. _ ” Shorter calls back sarcastically, muffled by the cushions. 

“Get up.” he says, leaving no room for questioning. 

Shorter lifts his head up from the sheets, putting his hands up like he’s pleading, puppy-dog eyes in full effect. He questions anyways. “What if we just like— had a sleep-over?”

“ _ Lazy-ass _ .” Ash says, throwing a pillow at the mass in the middle of his bed. 

Shorter grabs it and throws it back. “Yeah, well my ‘lazy-ass’ hurts.”

“Mine  _ too _ ,” Ash punctuates by smacking Shorter in the head with the same pillow, “but you don’t see  _ me _ climbing through  _ your _ window begging  _ you _ for a sleepover.”

In response Shorter just flops his head back onto the bed and groans louder. 

Ash sighs, reaches down and grips Shorter's ankle. At which Shorter yelps, attempting to kick off Ash’s grip. “Your hands are  _ freezing _ !” 

Ash just grins, taking hold of Shorter's lanky leg with both hands. 

It’s seconds too late when Shorter realizes the sheets underneath him give no grip. Ash pulls, dragging Shorter onto the floor in a tangled mess of sheets. 

With a thunk, Ash thinks he’s finally won. 

Until Shorter curls up on the ground, nuzzling into the blanket, smiling contently. 

“You’re an idiot, you know that?” Ash remarks, climbing over Shorter and laying onto the bed, wrapping an extra blanket around himself. 

Shorter smiles, “and yet, you still love me.”

“That’s debatable.” 

Shorter chuckles, reaches up and flicks the lights off. They lie in the dark for a moment before he speaks up again, “Goodnight, Ash.”

The party in question grumbles, shuffling in the remaining blanket. Shorter doesn’t expect an answer, but after a few seconds, Ash mumbles into the comforting air of the room, “g’night.”

… 

It’s the knocking that wakes him, Jessica calling for Ash, telling him that it’s time to get up. 

He doesn’t respond right away, sleepily getting out from under the covers, immediately tripping over Shorter’s sleeping form. Falling flat onto his face. 

“Ash? You okay in there?”

“ _ Ffff _ —” he stops himself, grabbing onto his elbow,  _ that’s gonna bruise,  _ “...Yeah!” he yells back. “Just tripped.”

“Ok,” she says, and he can almost see her nodding, (seems like a thing she’d do,) “Can I come in?” she asks after a beat.  _ No. You can’t. Because Shorter, the idiot, is still laying on the floor like a dog.  _

_ Uhh, frick.  _ “Yeah, just a moment.”

“Okay.” she says, “no rush.” and Ash bends down,

“ _ Shorter. _ ” Ash whisper-yells, kicking the sleeping teen. 

“Ow!” Shorter hisses back, “what was that for?”

“Get up.” Ash grits,

“What is it?” Shorter says, looking at Ash’s face, then he picks up his phone, cursing at the time. “ _ Crap _ .”

“ _ Hide _ .”

“I thought you said you weren’t grounded anymore?” he whispers,

“Doesn’t mean I’m exempt from getting  _ re-grounded.  _ Now  _ hide. _ ”

“Where?” Shorter asks, glancing around, “your rooms as barren as Mr. Mannerheims sex life.” Shorter giggles at his own joke, Ash swats his arm. Giving him a look. “ _ Hey _ !”

“I dunno,” Ash whispers, ignoring him entirely, turning towards the closet door, “see if there’s enough space under the bed.”

Ash is cursing now, opening it up,  _ why the hell is the closet full of useless crap? _

His face falls when he turns back around to see Shorter attempting to fit his ginormous head under the four inch space between the bed and the floor. 

Ash is looking at the curtains now, wondering if they’re too transparent. Which  _ yes _ , they just  _ had  _ to be. 

He looks back behind him, expecting Shorter to still be attempting to fit under the bed. (Like the doofus he is.) But when he looks, Shorter is  _ gone _ . 

_ What the hell?  _

Ash’s heart stops. 

He runs to the window to see Shorter crouch into the ground, stumbling. 

Shorter isn’t moving, and for a long moment, Ash isn’t either. 

Jessica’s still waiting for him, yet he can’t leave the windowsill, eyes trained on the teen below.

_ If he killed himself I swear to every holy thing on this planet I’m gonna murder him— _

He lets out the biggest sigh he has in years when he sees a thumbs up, Shorter looking up at him with that dumb grin on his face. 

_ Dramatic little bastard. Could’ve just climbed down.  _

Despite it all, Ash can’t help but smile back.

It doesn’t last long. Shutting the window tight and dashing to the opposite side of the room, opening the door for Jessica. 

He’s doing that thing again, where he speaks before the door’s open. “Sorry, I was just getting dressed—”

He stops when he sees her. She’s holding a stack of books. 

“...wha—?” Ash stops himself, looks at the covers. 

“You said you liked books.” she laughs sheepishly, 

“I can’t— I can’t take these…”  _ or maybe she wasn’t giving them to him. Greedy little bastard, think everything’s for you? Huh? _

“—don’t worry about it!” She interrupts his thoughts, “They weren’t being read anyways,” she explains, “just sitting in the basement collecting dust.”

“Wh— why?”  _ She can’t. She wouldn’t—  _

_ It’s a trick. Books are only for those sellout geeks in college.  _ That’s what Dino always told him. That Ash is a good for nothing— selfish— ungrateful little— 

“Why not?” she smiles, “you said you liked reading, we’ve got a bunch of unread books… It's like a match made in heaven.” She then carefully transfers the stack of books into Ash’s hands. Which are  _ not  _ trembling.

“Thank you,” he says, and his throat feels thick saying it.  _ Frick.  _ His eyes are welling up.  _ Not now. Not now.  _ “Uhh…” he coughs, “Where do you want me to Uhh—” he gestures around with his head, turning around to hide his face from her. 

“Oh!” She starts moving, walking into the room, “you could—” she looks around, “I guess you’re right,” she laughs, “there’s not really anywhere to put them…” a pause, then she points, “why don’t you just set them down there by your bed for now… then we’ll find a place for them sometime in the future.”  _ She says it so naturally. Future. Like I’ll be here for a while…  _ he wants to. Oh god he does. He wants this more than anything he’s wanted in a while. He knows he doesn’t deserve it. But— 

_ Maybe this is his purgatory.  _ Maybe Dino really  _ did _ kill him those two years ago, maybe this is Ash’s own personal hell, getting an ounce of kindness, all for it to go away.  _ Don’t let it go away.  _

_ Get a grip.  _

“O~ok.” He coughs, and does as she says, placing the books down by (his?) bed. Awkwardly rubbing his eyes against the cloth on his shoulder,  _ why the hell is he crying? It’s just a stack of old books.  _

Jessica seems to ignore the situation going on with Ash’s traitorous eyes,  _ thankfully.  _

…

Ash eats like he hasn’t in days.  _ Because, well… besides that bowl of cold Mac n’ Cheese.... he really hasn’t.  _

He thinks the cereal is called (are called?)  _ ‘Shreds’ _ , but the name doesn’t sound quite right on his tongue.  _ ‘Shredoodles’... ‘Sherdels’... _

_ Stupid brand names.  _

It’s not important— Ash is just running out of things to think about that don’t revolve around a _specific_ group of people. He won’t let himself go into more detail about who _exactly_ they are, because thinking of Dino at the moment is just about to send him spiralling into another panic attack. It’s probably an over exaggeration, but Ash’s anxiety makes him feel like he’s going to die from anything at any given moment. _Throwing up all the time, probably going to give yourself stomachs ulcers. Cancer. Heart attacks._

_ Frick. Why do you care? You want to die anyways.  _

Ash shovels another bite of the cereal into his mouth.  _ Dino’s not here right now. The least I can do is make it through the day.  _

Apparently Max had to drive out to his publisher or something. Ash doesn’t really get how newspaper companies (journalist headquarters?) work. He thought Max was some kind of freelance guy? He’ll have to do some research on it sometime. If these people ever let him go to the library. Or leave the house long enough for him to go there without them knowing. 

The point is, that Max has gone somewhere, for a meeting of sorts. And Jessica is currently standing in the kitchen in front of him, cooking something that smells nice. (Probably the only thing keeping him from throwing up this very second.) Michael’s next to him, happily eating some… ‘Lucky Charms’, he reads on the side of the box. Except the kid is only eating the marshmallow bits, carefully steering clear of the other cheerio-like stuff. 

Ash only remembers the brand because Griff would always get it for him when he was younger, or rather, the knock off version. 

He remembers complaining about it. That Griff never got him the more expensive version. Complaining about something so stupid when Griff and him were barely scraping by… 

The thought leaves a bitter taste in his mouth, and Ash can’t find it in himself to eat the last few bites of his cereal. 

He stands and tries to hide the bowl at his side, walking past Jessica to the sink. Acting as inconspicuous as he can so he can rinse it out before she sees what a waste he is. 

“Oh, I can get that for you.” Ash jumps,

“No, that’s okay—” but she’s already reached for it. Seeing the half eaten bowl of a cereal he can’t remember the name to. 

“You’re not hungry?” She asks, not rudely, tilting her head with genuine curiosity. 

“No.” Ash says, keeping the awkwardness out of his voice somehow. 

“Okay,” she says, walking over to Michael, “you done too, kiddo?” The child in question nods his head eagerly, big grin, jumping off the table and into the living room, where Ash can hear him clinking his toys together. 

Jessica opens her mouth to say something more when the doorbell rings, she furrows her eyebrows and places both bowls into the sink, “we’re not expecting any guests.” 

The way she says it makes Ash stand more on edge than usual, but she looks so casual, walking over to the front door.  _ Don’t open it. Don’t open it.  _ His gut is screaming. 

He hears the front door open, Ash can’t help but stand just around the corner. 

“Hi!” Jessica says to whoever’s there. “What can I do for you?”

“—we’re Ash’s friends,” he hears one of them say and—

He catches bright purple from the corner of his eye.  _ Holy sh— _

“Shorter?”

“Oh, hey Ash!” he waves past Jessica, smiling in Ash’s direction, all innocent like he isn’t here to make Ash’s life harder. “Me and Eiji have a project for History—”  _ Wait, wait, wait. ...Eiji? _

Without listening to Shorters words, Ash creeps closer to the door, and sure enough…. 

“How do _you_ two know each other?” He asks before he can stop himself. He _can’t believe this isn’t a fever dream. Why does everybody know where he lives?_ He thinks he cut Shorter off. Either way, the annoying purple haired teen smiles and answers him:

“We have a History project together,” He starts, and Ash can see Eiji wave.  _ Crap.  _ Why’s his stomach deciding to twist into a thousand knots at his  _ cute little smile _ ?— _ get your crap together Ash.  _ “Found out we both knew you mid conversation!” He laughs, “crazy huh?”

_ Downright impossible, the universe must hate him. _

“Yeah,” Ash says, and he doesn’t even  _ try _ to make his smile convincing.

“Why don’t you come in?” Jessica asks,  _ just  _ as he was beginning to like her.

Eiji finally speaks up, looking incredibly awkward and unsure of himself, “Shorter,” he turns to the teen in question, pulling at his hoodie like a kid might, “we shouldn’t interrupt.”

“Oh don’t be silly,” Jessica says. “I’m making some biscuits right now, why don’t you stay and have some?”

“Well… I wouldn’t dare turn down some good food!” Shorter shrugs, barging into  _ his  _ house. (or is it his? God, Ash is so confused.)

...

Ash doesn’t really have anything against talking to any of the people in this room, but the idea of them talking to  _ each other _ ? Makes him nervous, maybe they’ll connect the dots about him, realize what they couldn’t separately.  _ Frick,  _ Ash needs to sit down. He’s already sitting though. He feels like he needs to ‘double sit’.  _ If that's even a thing.  _

Ash needs sleep.

See, he’d be fine with them individually. But Eiji— It feels so  _ incredibly  _ awkward seeing Eiji, having ignored him straight up all friday. And he can’t even talk about it because Shorter is blabbering about some history project, and Jessica is not even a few feet away across the kitchen island.

“Sorry—” he starts when he finds a gap in Shorters rambling, and Jessica seems to have wandered off up the stairs, “and  _ why  _ do you need  _ my  _ help?”

“Did you fall and hit your head?” he replies, like what he’s saying is common knowledge, “Ash, you’re practically a  _ genius _ .” the compliment makes his face heat up, especially when Eiji perks up, 

“Really?” the boy says, looking between Ash and Shorter in awe,

“Yes—!”

“—No!”

Ash squints judgmentally at Shorter, who isn’t fazed one bit.

“He  _ is. _ ” Shorter emphasizes, “he reads for  _ fun. _ ”

Eiji looks confused, touches his bottom lip with the tip of his finger, “I read for fun…”

Shorter turns to Eiji, looking betrayed, “I've been surrounded by a bunch of nerds, Eiji! You’re supposed to be on my side!”

Eiji tilts his head, smiles awkwardly, “...sorry?”

Shorter slumps back into his chair all dramatically, with a hand at his forehead…  _ speaking of drama: _

“How’d you fare after that jump?”

Shorter leans forward, grins like a madman, Eiji just looks more confused.

Shorter slaps a hand down on his thigh, “If my leg wasn’t hurting like a mofo right now, this would be the best day of my life.” Ash looks down  _ and _ —  _ Oh god,  _ Shorters leg is wrapped up under a boot _. You did this. You did this— _

Shorter seems to notice the horror on Ash’s face, “Oh! I’m fine,” he waves off, “it’s probably not even sprained, Nadia’s just a worrywart, that and she would have smacked me if I didn’t claim I was seriously injured.” Shorter laughs,

Ash smacks him on the arm,  _ hard _ , Shorter whines, “what was  _ that  _ for?” Ash  _ would  _ have felt bad, if only because Eiji’s looking at him in shock,

“For making me worry.” he says, “and because Nadia didn’t.”

“ _ Mom. _ ”

“ _ Baby. _ ”

“ _ Nerd _ .”

“ _ Idiot.” _

“Why you two are hitting each other?” Eiji asks, worried,

Ash turns to look at Eiji, “Because _Shorter_ is a _dramatic_ _little_ _bastard_.” Shorter swats at him for that, turning to Eiji himself,

“ _ Because, _ ” he corrects, “I jumped out of a window.”

Ash interjects before Eiji can ask another question, and he knows he would have, his eyes having widened considerably, “ _ when  _ he reasonably could have just climbed down.”

“ _ Yeah _ ,” he agrees, “but hear me out:” he puts his hands up, like one would in a pitch meeting, “think of how much cooler it is to say I  _ jumped  _ out of a window versus, just simply climbing out of one.” He smirks at Eiji, “besides, I’ve climbed out of  _ thousands _ of windows before.”

“All of those being my window, of course.” Ash says, with a laugh at Shorter’s expense. 

“ _ Of course _ ,” he agrees, “whad’ya think I was saying?” Shorter stares directly at Ash, straight faced. Ash just rolls his eyes, which makes Shorter burst into a grin. “I’m joking, we all know I’m good with the ladies.”

“Good at scaring em’ off.” Ash rolls his eyes, Shorter huffs but otherwise ignores him, 

“What does this have to do with girls?” Eiji speaks up after a moment, still  _ very much  _ confused. 

“ _ Everything. _ ” Shorter says, resting an arm over Eiji’s shoulders,

“I… do not understand.” He’s pressing his finger to his lip again, nervous habit, Ash decides. 

“There  _ is  _ little to understand, see, women are very complex creatures.”

“I’d love to hear you say that to Nadia.” 

“ _ Hush _ , I’m teaching.” Shorter turns back to Eiji, “see, Eiji, when it comes to women you have to expect the unexpected.” Eiji nods, eyebrows furrowed, and lips puckered slightly, 

“What if I am not Uhh…” he looks down, fiddling with his shirt, flustered, “what is the word for it…  _ interested  _ in women…?”

Shorter’s head comes back for a second, Eiji seems to take that badly because he flushes bright red, “then that’s cool!” Shorter says grinning, and Eiji flushes harder, smiles that gentle smile, still fiddling with his shirt. 

Shorter takes the opportunity to look at Ash and wink,  _ what the hell does  _ that  _ mean? _

So Eiji’s gay,  _ what’s that got to do with him?  _

Ash’s face heats up anyways. 

Eiji excuses himself to the bathroom without even asking where it is, Ash and Shorter mutually ignoring any wetness they spotted near his eyes. If anyone asked, Ash could have sworn Jessica was cutting onions earlier. 

_ Besides _ , you’d have to be a demon to call Eiji out on it. 

...

“Okay, but like— sorry—” Ash starts, getting back on topic, to ignore that weird feeling in his chest, “why didn’t you just text me about this project? Have me come over to the Chang Dai? I’m sure that would’ve been an easier place for all of us to meet up.”  _ Given me some warning about having to socialize. _

Or maybe Shorter knew Ash would have made up some excuse not to come _.  _

“Because you would have made up some dumb excuse not to come.”  _ Ah. _ “and—” he looks around, leaning forward to whisper, “—I wanted to check these people out.”  _ Things click into place.  _

“There’s no project,” Ash leans back, arms folded, “ _ is there _ ?”

“No there is.” He confirms, “there’s no way I could’ve convinced Eiji to lie about that... besides if I was lying, I would have just come by myself. But this works better, Eiji looks more innocent. Parents are probably a lot more willing to let  _ him _ into their homes than me,” he gestures to his brightly coloured hair, piercings end sunglasses, “ _ although _ …” he adds, “the project  _ was _ pretty much the perfect excuse to come check in on you.”

“Check in on me?” Ash asks, “then what the  _ hell _ was this morning?”

“I don’t need to explain myself to you.” Shorter says jokingly, but still gets away without telling Ash, because Jessica comes walking back down the stairs. 

“Oh where’s your other friend?” she says, waltzing into the kitchen. 

“He just had to use the bathroom.” Ash answers, looking behind him, “I should actually probably go check on him, make sure he found it alright.” 

Jessica excuses him, so Ash gets up and starts walking towards the hallway.

Shorter and Jessica talking without him there is  _ terrifying _ , but talking to Eiji right now is much more important, because the least he can do is apologize to him, before Eiji realizes what a fraud he is. 

Ash himself, faintly remembers where the bathroom is, having been laughing like a maniac the first time he went into it.

Ash knocks, the door isn’t even shut.

“Ah!” Eiji puts on a smile, noticing Ash, wiping rapidly at his eyes, “I am fine! My eyes are just against me!”

“It’s okay to cry.” Ash says, not even sure about what he’s saying, he  _ thinks  _ it was the right thing to say?  _ How does one comfort a friend? Are they even considered friends? _

“It’s uhh…” Eiji wipes another tear, “just so different to Japan… you not even know me… and yet you still not judge me for…” he lets out a laugh. Ash doesn’t filter his words, doesn’t  _ have  _ to,

“How could I judge you for something like that?”  _ Of course I couldn’t, even if I wanted to, because then if I’d just be the biggest hypocrite in the world.  _

_ Imagine it; a whore judging a man for who he likes.  _ Ash laughs internally at the thought.

“Thank you,” Eiji says, with a small smile, “the people in Japan had a very much different response.” Ash feels a pang in his chest,

“I’m sorry for that.”

“Oh don’t say that!” Eiji reprimands him gently.  _ So  _ gently, in fact, that Ash isn’t even sure he’s being reprimanded. “You are not responsible for their actions, besides,” he waves off, “it is all in the past.” After a moment of silence, Eiji lets out a laugh, that giddy one from the first day they met. 

“What’s so funny?” He asks, with genuine curiosity. 

Eiji wipes what’s left of the tears from his eyes, “oh, it is nothing.” He breathes a laugh again, “I just think it is funny, I do not even know you, but here I am, crying in your bathroom.” Ash huffs out something that’s barely a laugh,

“I guess it is.” Ash sighs.  _ Now’s your chance, remember, at least you’ll get to say sorry before they find out what kind of scum you are _ , “I… I wanted to apologize about Friday.”

Eiji’s face screws up, “What is there to apologize for?” he asks, so innocently. Like Ash isn’t the biggest mess up in the world.

“For ignoring you the whole day.”

“I’m sure you had a reason.” He says, like ‘that's that.’ No other convincing needed.

“What if I— what if I didn’t?” Ash asks, because he  _ needs  _ to know.

Eiji tilts his head, “did you?” 

_ Did I? _

“Yes—? No—?” Ash deflates a little, “I don’t know…” He rubs his fingers into the side of his temple, like all the mantras he keeps saying to himself, “I was just caught up in a lot of things…”

“ _ That, _ ” Eiji explains, “is a reason.”

“ _ No _ ,” Ash corrects, “it isn’t.”

“Did you ignore me, with the  _ intent _ of upsetting me?”

“I upset you?” Ash asks, because  _ that _ , if anything, worries him.

“That is not what I asked,” Eiji pouts, looking at him expectantly.

Ash sighs, “...no... I didn’t.”

“Then you have a reason,” he says, as confidently as one would a fact, “simple as that.”

… 

Jessica is asking Shorter questions about the restaurant his sister runs when Ash and Eiji walk back into the room. Somehow, (besides some rosy cheeks,) there seem to be no traces of the crying fit Eiji had. 

They sit down at the kitchen island on either side of Shorter, and the awkwardness almost decides to set in, but Jessica has never given a crap about room atmosphere. 

“How’s school going?” she asks, checking whatever’s in the oven, before typing a number on the microwave,  _ a timer probably.  _

“Good—”

“—Alright—”

“—Fine.” They respond in unison. Jessica turns her full attention to them,

“Oh come on!” She smiles, “you can give me better answers than that! Do you have any classes together?”

“Me and Ash have Bio together,” Shorter speaks up first, “and Eiji and I share a project in History.”

“How's that going?”

“Well Ash here was going to help us get started,” he grins, elbowing Ash. 

“You’ve taken History already?”

“ _ No. _ ” 

The conversation stops for a moment as the microwave beeps and Jessica leans down to take the food out of the oven. She places it on top of the stove, and shuts the oven door. Taking her mitts off, she walks over to the fridge. 

Looking over, Shorter is watching Jessica as she walks away.

Ash smacks him, “Can you  _ not  _ stare at my foster mom?” He whispers, just quiet enough that Jessica can’t hear. 

“You are one to talk.” Eiji says, looking at something with the corner of his eye.

Ash’s face goes hotter than the oven Jessica’s cooking with. 

He had almost forgotten about that. 

Shorter grins and looks between them, “what’s going on here?” He has the audacity to look giddy, “ _ Eiji. _ ”

“...yes?”

Shorter bows hands together in prayer position, “Teach me your ways,”

“...I...do not understand?”

Shorter opens his mouth to say something more, but just laughs and turns to Ash, whispering, “why didn’t you introduce me to Eiji sooner? He is like— the reincarnation of adorableness, and yet, I’m convinced he’s secretly an evil mastermind.”

Ash is still flustered, doesn’t know how to respond to Shorter,  _ what did he even say?  _

Ash  _ really _ needs to go to sleep. 

Jessica comes back, places a slab of butter on a plate into the microwave. 

“So how long have you guys known Ash?” she asks, putting her oven mitts back on, dumping the biscuits onto an already laid out clean dish towel. 

_ Uhh. Crap.  _ Ash’s mind is racing. Shorter met Ash in juvie, cause Ash decided to go beat up a “poor,” “helpless” old man. 

Maybe this was the moment he was picturing. 

The moment they put it all together. 

“Oh,” Shorter starts casually, “me and Ash met at summer camp.” 

... _ huh? _

“That’s fun!” She says, as she uses one of those food brush thingies to spread the melted butter over the biscuits. 

_ Why— why would Shorter lie? He wouldn't do it for me— would he? _

Ash is still getting used to the whole  _ ‘friend’ _ thing. 

“What about you?” she asks, sensing the silence coming from Eiji. 

“Oh,” he says, a little startled, “I only just transferred here last week.” He scratches at his bottom lip. 

“You’re a transfer student?” Jessica asks, question directed at Eiji. 

“Yes, my mentor Ibe-san brought me from Japan.” She stops on her tracks, 

“Ibe?” She raises her eyebrows, “I think I know who you’re talking about,” she says, rubbing the side of her forehead, closing her eyes like what she wants to say is  _ just  _ on the tip of her tongue. She snaps her fingers, after a second, “Sunichi Ibe, the photographer, right?” 

“...yes, actually.” Eiji says, genuinely surprised.

“Oh wow! We used to go to college together! Do you guys live close to here?” She asks, Eiji smiles,

“We live just past the school on ninety-first street!”

“That’s awesome,” she laughs, “you’ll have to ask him to stop by!”

…

Eiji and Jessica discuss for a bit, of things Ash knows next to nothing about. 

Jessica pulls the second batch of biscuits out minutes later, and Shorter almost burns his fingers off, grabbing one of the hot ones. 

After the biscuits have cooled down, and Shorter’s snatched his fair share, Jessica suggests they go upstairs to Ash’s room to work on the project. 

“I’ve never been here before!” Shorter exclaims sarcastically like the obnoxious little bastard he is when they open up the door to Ash’s pseudo-room, 

Eiji looks like he’s still majorly confused by absolutely everything that comes out of Shorter’s mouth. Ash would be lying to say  _ he  _ isn’t sometimes.

Turns out they really  _ do  _ need Ash’s help with their project, because they know next to nothing about transnational corporations, tariff trade barriers, or minimum wage. Which their project seems to be  _ directly _ centred around. 

“Do you know what globalism is?” Ash asks, sitting on the bed, Shorter and Eiji listening intently, notebooks and pencils at ready,

Shorter raises his hand, “That’s when you’re discriminatory towards another planet, right?”

_ Oh god this is worse than I thought.  _

… 

The project goes just as well as Ash expected, the least he could do was set them on the right path. 

_ That poor teacher is gonna have a fun time making heads and tails of whatever dumpster fire they present.  _

They leave the house six hours after they entered it. Ash is still surprised they stayed that long. 

Did he enjoy it?  _ Yeah _ . 

Would he do it again? __

_ Not in a million years. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was the chapter I was working on a few weeks ago as a way to procrastinate the earlier one, aka: I needed some fluff in my life!
> 
> Did this chapter make any sense? Probably not. But I enjoyed writing it, so yeah :)
> 
> Oh boy, this one was much longer than usual! but I doubt you mind that :P 
> 
> \+ it’s called History class in the states right? Over here we call it Social Studies, so like— I don’t know what the correct terminology is? Tell me if I’m wrong, lol. (I’ve read so many fics where they call it History so I've come to the conclusion that it’s the right thing.)
> 
> On another note, my dad accidentally sliced his finger open with an exacto knife Monday night :D gave me and my mom the heebie jeebie’s, but the whole time he was like, “I’ll just put a bandaid on it,” and we’re like, “you should go to the hospital!” Anyways… he’s fine! Me and my mom thought he sawed his finger off with an electric saw at first, when he went “oops” and then didn’t answer us. XD
> 
> So Uhh… he Krazy Glue’d it shut??? He keeps coming up to me like ‘you wanna see it? It looks cool!’ 
> 
> Oh my gosh I swear this is it for end notes! Just one question: my fic summary, is the correct grammar supposed to be ‘in come Max and Jessica’? Or ‘in comes Max and Jessica’? It’s been bothering me for a while now, and I can’t get it out of my head. Please help!
> 
> Edit: it has ‘come’ to my attention (XD) that the correct grammar is ‘in come Max and Jessica’ so thank you everybody!! :D
> 
> Anyways, gotta love the verbal diarrhea! How are you guys doing?


	15. “Now why would I do that, sweetie?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MY GOSH I'M SO EMBARRASSED. 
> 
> Aight so, I did some more fanart, but like— I was so tired that when I finished it, for some reason I thought it looked good? When it did NOT. (Proportions were off, colouring was weird af, everyone looked ugly, oh poor Jessica XD, and I— I’m just— I don’t know how I ever thought it looked good???) And I put it up on Imgur for pretty much the whole day. I could only sign in from my computer, so even during my break at work I couldn’t pull out my phone and delete the post. So I had to sit there and look at this ugly piece of artwork, and hope not too many people saw it. I deleted that as soon as I could, and redid the art the same night, so thankfully it looks better than before! I am so sorry to anyone who saw the original XD (Thanks for listening to the word vomit!)
> 
> Not Horrible Artwork XD: https://m.imgur.com/gallery/C8Q4wG7 
> 
> ———————————————
> 
> Check for TW’s in the end notes. This is one of those chapters.
> 
> ———————————————

His head’s thick with fog when he wakes up, having slept more than he has in years. 

Ash had crashed sometime around nine-o’clock which makes a total of ten hours unconscious. 

It’s a Monday, which means he’s back at school, which is good, Ash hates being cooped up, even with pleasant company. Makes him think of Dino, makes him think of _Grace—_

He didn’t have any nightmares last night, at least he doesn’t think he did. Just a blank sleep, which he’s more than thankful for. 

Walking downstairs, Max greets him.

“Hey, buddy.”

“Hey.”

Max looks over at the clock on the wall, “you’re up early.”

Ash shrugs, “I guess I am.”

They’re both sitting at the kitchen island, a few feet apart. Not talking.

Ash can’t tell if saying something will make the silence more glaringly obvious, so he keeps his mouth shut.

Max doesn’t have the same forward thinking, “you ever play crib?”

Ash looks at him all confused, “like a baby crib?”

Max laughs, “I’ll take that as a no.” He gets up from his stool, and walks out of the room. For a moment Ash is left wondering if he’s going to come back, but he does. A wooden board (game board?) under his arm and a deck of cards. 

“Cribbage is a card game,” he explains, placing the game board down.

“Then what is _that_ for?”

Max looks up, and over to what Ash points at, “ _that_ is for keeping score.”

Ash sits up, interested, “how do you play?”

“I’ll explain as we go.” he says, sorting through the deck, pulling out the jokers and tossing them aside. 

Then Max is dealing, placing six cards in front of each of them. 

Ash picks up the one’s in front of him, “so what exactly am I supposed to do?”

“Here,” he waves towards himself, “show me your cards,” he studies them for a second, “so okay, here you’ve got a five, a jack, an eight, a seven, a three and a two. So the point of the game is to either get a run, a pair, or have your cards add up to fifteen. And you’ve got to get rid of two of them and put them in this pile. It’s my crib so I would get these cards at the end.”

Ash just looks at Max like he’s grown a second head, “literally none of that makes sense.”

“Just bare with me.” He points back at Ash’s cards, “just— Uhh, for now all you’ve got to worry about is getting rid of _two cards._ ”

Ash nods, “So which ones would be better to get rid of?”

“Look here,” he groups the five and the jack, “that would add up to fifteen, and same here,” he groups the eight and the seven. His face widens, “oh yeah, I forgot to say, all face cards are equal to ten, and ace is always low.”

_Okay._

“So I’m assuming I could group the Jack, the three and the two together to get fifteen?” Ash asks,

“Yup!” Max smiles. “So in this situation you’d want to get rid of the two and the three, because even though those three cards add to fifteen, they don’t get you nearly as many points as these cards would give you.”

“Okay,” Ash places them in the middle.

“Okay, now we're _pegging._ ”

If Ash was drinking something he would have spat it out. 

His voice is hoarse, “...what?”

“It’s where you take turns placing cards, and if you add up to exactly thirty-one you get two points, you can’t go higher than thirty-one either.” he explains, 

_Okay, definitely not what I was thinking it was._

“have you ever played Black Jack?” He asks. 

Ash used to watch his dad play it, all of his friends smoking and drinking in the diner.

Jim never hit Ash, but he was always meaner when he lost a game.

“Yeah,” 

“So it’s just like that,”

“Okay.”

They continue like that. To the point where a few rounds in Ash has already got the hang of it.

“Fifteen is two points, plus a pair, is four, these three make fifteen…” Max adds up,

Ash doesn’t think before he speaks, “that’s twelve points.”

“Woah, give me a second Mr. Einstein.” Max teases,

Ash flushes at the praise, “it’s not _that_ hard.”

Max laughs, “wow, just hit me while I’m down, would you?” 

Five minutes later Ash is laying down two sevens, an eight, an ace, and a starting card of another eight. 

“Fourteen points,” he smirks, “I win.”

“You skunked me!” Max laughs, defeated.

“...huh?”

“Look here,” he points at the crib board, to a little ‘S’ in the middle, “that's the skunk line. It means you demolished me!” 

Ash panics a little, “sorry…”

“Oh don’t be!” he waves off, “I’m happy! You’re a crib natural.” he laughs again, “maybe we should set you up in a tournament or something.”

Ash scoffs at the idea, “do they even _have_ tournaments for this?”

“I have no idea!” Max shrugs, shuffling the cards, “But now's a good time to find out.”

Overall, Ash likes spending time with Max.

Even if he _is_ really loud.

They play a few more games before it’s time to go.

Ash only loses once.

Max does _not_ live it down. 

...

Surprisingly Jessica is the one to drop him off at school today. Apparently Max has some journalist thing he has to get done by tomorrow. Some deadline for a story. 

Ash doesn’t get why he’d spend that time playing crib with him when he had more important things to do.

Ash waves at Michael as he leaves. The kid waves back. He catches that same hint of a smile on Jessica’s lips. He doesn’t understand why she gets that look on her face. Like Ash did something good. Like he _is_ good. 

He says bye to her like usual when he exits the car, except he doesn’t feel any kind of awkward doing it.

It’s strange how that happens. How awkward he was when Shorter had first started taking an interest in getting to know him. Getting to know _Ash._ For who he was, not because of whatever rumours had been spread of his whorring skills. 

The point is. Ash doesn’t get it. How one day he’s uncomfortable getting more than two words out, and the next he’s cracking jokes like a madman. 

He’s not _that_ comfortable around Max or Jessica yet, but he isn’t opposed to the idea. 

He likes it. Likes having someone there who gives a crap. But he’d be lying to say it doesn’t scare him to death, feeling vulnerable. 

Ash shakes his head, gets his thoughts cleared up before walking through the door. He’s early enough that Mr. Mannerheim hasn’t shown up yet. Probably watching porn in the bathroom. 

(The dude wasn’t a pedophile or anything, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t one _creepy_ looking guy.)

Never mind that. Priorities first. 

The first thing Ash does when he walks into the class is smack Shorter across the arm. 

“Ow! What the hell was _that_ for?” He whines, rubbing his bicep over the thick hoodie he’s wearing. “You’re gonna give me a bruise!”

“And you’d _deserve_ it, too.” Ash sits, wags his finger at him, mumbling, “ _jumping out of a damn window_ .” He turns back to Shorter, “do you know how _dumb_ of an idea that was?”

“ _Yeah, yeah_!” He says, shoulders up, “we discussed this yesterday, didn’t we?” 

Ash squints at him, “I just had to _remind_ you.” He says, taking his notes out. After a moment he mumbles, shaking his head again, “ _jumping out of a window_ .” He looks at Shorter, “a _window,_ Shorter.”

Shorter attempts to ignore him. 

Ash just makes a tutting noise, muttering, slowly and dramatically, “ _jumped_ out of a damn _window….”_

Shorter slams his pencil onto his desk, “ _Oh_ my god.” He says, “What’re you? _Nadia_ ? She already gave me an hour long lecture about _not_ jumping out of windows.” He lets out a laugh, “she sent me a twenty slide powerpoint presentation detailing the _five stages of grief_.” 

Ash doesn’t speak for a minute, and Shorter thinks he’s let it go, before Ash smacks his hand onto the table, “You _jumped_ out of a _window_.”

“If you say _jump_ or _window_ one more time I swear to god Ash—”

… 

Ash seeks Shorter out at lunch. They walk silently towards the cafeteria before Shorter takes a sharp turn in the _wrong_ direction. 

“ _Where_ are you going?”

Shorter doesn’t answer him, just opens the door to the library. 

“If this is about the ‘w’ word or ‘j’ word thing, I already said I’m not apologizing—”

“Hey Eiji!” Shorter yells out, interrupting. Ash looks over and sees a certain black haired boy startle, then wave excitedly in their direction. 

Ash would be lying to say he wasn’t happy with this development. 

They settle themselves next to Eiji. Who seems to be smiling effortlessly. 

“Oh hello Ash and Shorter!”

Ash waves, somehow awkward about how his voice sounds. _What the absolute hell is happening to him?_

All of that flies out the window in seconds, “ _what…_ is _that_?”

Eiji’s eyebrows screw together for a moment before he sees what Ash is pointing at, “Ah!” He says, “This is Natto!” He then uses his chopsticks to pull a small amount out, Ash _thinks_ the stuff at the bottom is rice. But what the _hell_ is that brown stuff on the top. It looks sticky. 

Ash breathes in— _oh god—_ it stinks too, and not the _good_ kind of stink either. 

“It is my favourite food!” Eiji shares happily, “I love cooking!” He pulls up another mouthful, beginning to hold it out “do you want to try—?” He stops, and pouts, “stop gagging! That is not funny!” Ash stops, smiles sheepishly, “It is good! I promise!”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Eiji pouts again. 

Ash pouts back. 

Eiji’s looking at him with doe eyes. 

Ash sighs, “fine. _Fine._ I’ll try it.”

Eiji’s face lights up as he holds out a bite. 

Ash leans forward, plucks the stuff off of Eiji’s chopstick with his hand. Pops it into his mouth. 

Half of it’s sticking to his hand still. 

And he’s glad, because _oh holy hell, it tastes worse than it smells._

“It’s… uhh… great!” He says around the food, unable to bring himself to swallow. 

Eiji brightens exponentially, “would you like some more?”

“ _No._ ” He says way too fast. Eiji just pouts again.

“Fine! More for me!” Then he scoops some into his mouth, doing a little shoulder jiggle dance. 

Ash has _still_ got this _stuff_ in his mouth. He can’t just _spit it out._ Looking around, Ash wilts, shuddering as the stuff goes down his throat. _Bleh. Never trying that again._

_Now what do I do about the stuff still on my hands?_

“—I am back!” Shorter calls out, hopping into his chair. _Wow. I hadn’t even realized he’d left. What a truly incredible friend I am._ Shorter gives his stomach a pat. “Now that I’m empty, left a _nice big deuce_ , I’m ready for some lunch!” Ash curls his face in disgust,

“ _Shorter_ , literally _nobody_ wants to hear about your bowel movements.” Shorter’s looks affronted,

Eiji raises his hand, “...I want to hear about his bowel movements.”

“See,” Shorter says, gesturing to the black haired boy, “Eiji gets it.” And if Eiji doesn’t look frickin _triumphant_. 

_What the hell?_

But not even seconds later does the boy in question lean over, whispering to Ash, “what is a ‘bowel movements’?”

_Oh for the love of—_

Now he’s gonna have to explain the digestive system with the aftertaste of that weird brown sticky stuff still in his mouth, isn’t he? 

_Oh._ The universe must _truly_ hate him. 

… 

It’s minutes later. Eiji’s face having flushed at the explanation Ash gave him. Stating profusely that he is _not_ interested in Shorters poop. 

Ash is laughing, _hard_. And Eiji is looking more and more flustered by the second. 

They’re giggling like idiots. So loud, in fact, that Ash almost doesn’t catch his name being said over the intercom. But there it is: _Aslan Callenreese_ —

_That’s strange._

“Aslan Callenreese, please come down to the front office. Aslan Callenreese, please come down to the front office. ~Thank you.”

“Ooh, looks like you’re in trouble.” Shorter teases, but stops smiling when he sees the look on Ash’s face. Sobering himself. “I doubt it’s anything bad, Ash. They’re probably just pestering you about classes next term.”

Ash gulps, and nods. “Yeah.” He says with a shaking voice. “It’s probably nothing.”

_Dino’s in a coma. Dino’s in a coma. Dino’s in a coma—_

“Asran Carren— Carlenl— nan demo—” Eiji does one of those cute scowls, “that is _you_?”

Ash would’ve laughed at the complete butcher of his last name. If his heart wasn't lodged down his throat. “ _It is_.”

“Then you should go, yes?”

“Uhh…” he clears his throat, “yeah.”

_Dino’s in a coma. Dino’s in a coma. Dino’s in a coma._

“Do you want me to come with you?” Shorter asks, half standing up. 

Ash waves him off, gives him his best smile, “no, I’ll be fine.”

Ash picks his bag up from the floor, slinging it onto his shoulder. His legs carry him forward, because he doesn’t think he has the will to move on his own. _It’s probably nothing. Just like Shorter said._

Ash takes a deep breath and walks his way down to the front office. _It’s nothing. Dino’s in a coma. He can’t hurt you._

_...not until he wakes up. It’s only a matter of time._

_Frick_. 

Ash hates his brain sometimes. 

He passes the French room. — _English room?_ No, no. It was the Math room. Yeah, he’s on the first floor. Mr. Zakharev’s class. 

_Get a damn grip. It’s just the front office. Blanca’s probably just playing some sort of joke._

But his gut’s never wrong. 

_What about yesterday? You thought Jessica was going to get murdered by some random people on the other side of the door. But it was just Shorter and Eiji._

Of course he can be wrong. This is probably just another one of those times, right? _What is he talking about?_

He’s always wrong. He’s just a _dumb—_ _ignorant— selfish piece of—_

He’s at the front office. 

The door is open. 

He recognizes that silhouette. 

Marvin. 

_Marvin._

_No._

_No, no, no._

_Nonononnononothisisn’thappening—_

_Marvin isn’t— he isn’t supposed to come inside the school. He isn’t— Ash is supposed to be safe here— Dino’s in a coma— Dino’s in a—_

“Oh, Aslan!” That same lady with the Bob cut calls out when she sees him, “Mr. Crosby came in to sign you out of class, he said he’s got something fun planned.” She smiles —or she _sounds like she is_. Ash can’t look away from Marvin. 

He’s got this big slimy grin on his face. Ash can’t help but notice the way he’s curling his fingers. _In anticipation? Hunger?_ Ash can’t look away— he can’t _look away. He can’t—_

He smiles. _It’s okay._

He’s used to this, isn’t he?

He walks over to the front desk, leaning against the counter. “Yep,” he says, popping the ‘p’, he turns and looks Marvin right in the eye, “just let me drop my backpack off first.”

Marvin’s smirk gets bigger, “Oh, you can just put it in the back of my car. I’ll keep _good_ care of it—”

That same fear’s trying to come out again, it makes his voice shiver ever so slightly, “I’m good.” Another smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, “It’ll only take a second.”

“Are you sure—?”

“—I’m sure.” Ash interrupts. He can’t hide the way he grits his teeth together. _Deep breaths._ He turns to walk out—

“Why don’t I come with you?” A voice so close— _too close._ His breath catches, stuck. Ash can barely breathe. _It’s okay. It’s okay._

_Deep breaths._ He’s desperately telling himself. 

He knows he’s breathing. 

Then why does he feel like all the oxygen has been sucked away?

“—oh sure.” The lady says, and Ash feels a hand come down to rest on his shoulder. 

Ash is rapidly trying to remember if there are any bathrooms on the way to his locker. He doesn’t think he’ll be able to live with the shame of knowing what he did in a place like this. 

“C’mon,” Marvin breathes, _hot breaths ragged, ‘oh my poor baby,’ ‘I love you Ash,’ ‘you’re so beautiful when you cry,’—_ “let’s go.” 

Ash can only nod. 

He’s walking. 

His locker is up the stairs. 

_One step._

_Two steps._

_Three steps._

“Why are you here?”

_He glares at his feet._

_The hand burns like hot iron._

“I came to see you.”

_Another step._

_He’s lost count._

“You didn’t come to see me.” He doesn’t know what he’s saying. He doesn’t feel like he’s saying anything. _Is he laughing?_ “You came to get your dick sucked.”

_The ground is level again, only for a moment._

_One step._

“Always so crude.”

_A laugh._

_He catches the tip of his shoe on the end of the step._

He slips. 

He doesn’t feel himself hit the stairs. 

_Where is he?_

“—let me help you—”

He turns, he’s sitting on the steps. 

Marvins here. _Marvins here._

He’s breathing so heavily. _The air is so thin._

One. Two. Three. Four— Two. Three. Four— Four. Five— One—

A hand reaches forward. It’s big. _So big._

He hits it away without thinking. 

The motion feels slower than it is somehow. 

Like he’s dragging his arm through water. 

Marvins face twists into a sneer. 

“ _Get up_.”

He can’t breathe. 

_Why can’t he breathe?_

“I—” he swallows the bile building up at the back of his throat, “I don’t have to go with you.”

_Shut up. Shut up. Blanca isn’t here to save you._

_But Dino isn’t here either. Marvin doesn’t have any leash on me._

“ _What_?” He snaps.

“I don’t,” Ash gasps another breath, gripping white knuckled onto the steps, “I don’t have to go with you.”

He reaches down and grabs Ash by the side of his collar, pulling him up. Ash’s bag falls onto the steps beside him. Marvin breathes down Ash’s neck, _cigarettes. It’s always those same damn cigarettes. The same damn smell._

_How many times did he put them out on me?_

“And what makes you think that?” Shivers run along his ear, as the air tickles the hairs there. 

Ash can’t help but look around, _how does nobody see? How is there nobody here to see?_

Ash laughs, cold and bitter, “I belong to Dino don’t I? He wouldn’t want you messing with his merchandise.”

Marvin scoffs, “I don’t give a rats ass about that.” His lip curls, “besides… he’ll probably thank me.”

“And why would he do that?” Ash can’t keep nervousness out of the question. 

Marvin’s slammed him over to the wall by the side of the staircase. Ash has to lean over the railing for his back to meet with the drywall behind it. 

Marvin’s eyes go dark before he answers, licking his lips like some kind of animal. “Yer’ like a car,” he starts, hand trailing down Ash’s thigh, digging his dull fingernails into Ash’s skin, forcing his legs apart, “you gotta take it for a ride every now and then so it doesn’t get rusty.” Marvin leans closer, pressing flush against Ash. Lips drawing closer to his neck. 

“Get _off_ of me.” Ash chokes. 

He turns slightly, and pushes against Marvin, to get him away. The man doesn’t budge. Putting his arms down against the railing on either side of Ash. 

“Now why would I do that, sweetie?”

_Why— why would he? Think. Damnit think._

_Get him away. Get him off. I can’t—_

_Think. You can’t get him off unless you think._

“Be-because lunch is almost over.” He says almost desperately. “If anyone spots us in this position I’m sure it’ll raise a few questions.” 

It’s quiet, Marvin tenses around him.

Ash can’t breathe, for those few seconds. 

_He’s gonna kill me._

Marvin sneers, but otherwise removes his hands from around him. Ash is filled with some kind of relief when his feet hit the ground again. 

Ash turns, head down, walking as quick as he can past Marvin. Taking a few steps at a time. 

He thinks he’s shut his eyes. _Just get away from him. Then you can think. Just get him away._

“You always had the best taste in partners, Ash.”

_Just keep walking. Only a few steps away. Just ignore him—_

He can’t help it.

“ _What do you mean by that?_ ”

Marvin laughs, that sick laugh, the one he’d let out anytime Ash’s body responded the way he wanted, the way that made Ash want to _scream_ , “I was thinking of coming to your house yesterday… saw two oriental boys.” He pauses for extra measure, “you wouldn’t want me to pay them a _visit_ now, _would you_?”

Ash’s gut drops. He turns, “You _couldn’t_.”

“Like I said,” he downturns his face, looking at Ash over his sunglasses, shrugging, “you were great at picking out the best whores.” 

Something in Ash’s stomachs curdles, 

It makes his blood boil. 

“How would you know?” He sneers, taking a step down the stairs. 

_Just ignore him. He can’t do anything here._

Marvin just laughs again. 

“Grace always _was_ better than you in bed.”

Ash stops. Screws his eyes shut. 

_He pounds at the door. Over and over. He can’t reach the door knob. He can’t reach it— can never reach it—_

One step. 

“So exotic, a true beauty, it’s a shame she was always so filthy looking.”

_Ash tucks a loose lock of her tightly curled black hair behind her ear. A pained smile gracing his lips when it pops right back to where it was. He presses a gentle kiss to her forehead. Her eyes are shut. Dried with tears._

“She’d always cry so _easily_.”

Another step. 

_The rafters heaved under the weight. Swaying like the mass below it._

“It’s really a shame…”

Two steps.

“What happened to her.”

_‘Clean it up before I get home. I don’t want this filth in here.’_

Three steps. 

_He doesn’t know how many times he read that note. How many times he read those words over and over. Her beautiful handwriting, his last memento. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry—_

Four steps. 

“But we all should have expected it,”

_He’d have burned his hand off to get it back._

“That girl really was nothing but a—“

He doesn’t hear his words. His eyes are shut. And for simply a moment, everything is quiet. He can see her face. Clearly for the first time in months. 

_“I love you, Ash.” She had said, hair splayed against the bed cushions, her smile brighter than all those times he’d seen before, the light from the windowsill illuminating her perfect brown skin, “let’s run away together.”_

Ash reaches out, without even having to think about it. 

_Grace—_

The bell rings. 

Ash opens his eyes. 

Marvin’s laying at the bottom of the steps. 

He isn’t moving. 

_Why isn’t Marvin moving?_

A couple kids from down below are peaking over. 

They look scared. Scared of Ash. 

Ash looks down. 

His hands are out. 

_What did you—?_

_What did I—?_

“I—”

Ash doesn’t think. 

He doesn’t have the capacity to. 

He runs. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Sexual harassment. Non consensual groping. Flashbacks of Implied rape/non-con. Crude language. Implied past character death.
> 
> I’M SORRY OKAY? 
> 
> This isn’t exactly how I wanted the chapter to be, and yet, in some ways, I feel like I did a better job in getting across what I wanted to get across, than I thought I would... hopefully. 
> 
> +I was gonna have another chapter of fluff before this, but thought, “you guys are ready for the angst.”
> 
> +I will not be specifying what exactly Marvin was planning to say there at the end… ಠ_ಠ Lets just say it wasn’t nice, and it isn’t something I ever plan on saying, for any reason whatsoever. 
> 
> +And for those of you who might be confused what exactly happened this chapter at the end there, it will be explained more in the next one. Because reading this back, I can see that some people might get confused about it? Tbh, I probably would be if I read it without the context that I have. 
> 
> +As for those of you who might ask, “Why the hell would the front office lady let Marvin just take Ash???” and to that I answer: Marvins been to the school almost everyday to pick Ash up from school and bring him to Dino’s. Marvin is a chauffeur. So the front office lady most definitely recognises him by now. ~But on another note, in the past, Marvin has never been permitted by Dino to take Ash out of school early, (it would raise too many questions if that was happening all the time) but now that Dino’s in a coma, Marvin thinks he’s all high and mighty.
> 
> +I changed a few lines of dialogue in the 3rd chapter, because well, some plans changed in regards to Ash’s past. The dialogue change is something along the lines of:
> 
> “you remember what happened the first time I tried to run away?”
> 
> “Dino that fat piece of—“
> 
> Aka: changed ‘what happened the first time I tried to tell someone’ to ‘the first time I tried to run away’ and the name ‘Marvin’ to ‘Dino’ :P
> 
> +Also, is it bad that the hardest thing to write in this chapter was the fluff? (._.)
> 
> +I like to play crib with my dad, and it’s the funniest thing, I’m good with math, right? I’m good at variables, trigonometry, physics, etc... but when it comes to adding simple things like eight and nine, sometimes I have to stop and think for a good minute XD (additional word vomit: my dad calls one of the aspects of the game cribbage ‘pegging’ (I don’t know if that’s the official name or not) and I have to stop myself from laughing every time I hear it. Because I do NOT want to explain to my dad how I know what that is. XD)
> 
> +In case you couldn’t tell, Grace is Ash’s 14yr old crush. Btw, I suck at character descriptions. I swear I’ll try my best with all of the OC’s in this story. So hopefully you have some idea of what Grace is supposed to look like :P
> 
> +the hardest part about all of this, I think, is trying to balance plot with character interactions. Because as a writer I want to just— move onto the next thing, go over the exciting stuff. But I also know that the exciting stuff won’t be nearly as impactful if I don’t spend the time trying to make the characters' bonds seem realistic. Eh. Anyways. Thank you for reading this!! The support you guys have given me is honestly— it’s mind boggling. Thank you so much!!


	16. “What did you expect from a punk like me?”

Ash doesn’t know how he got to the bathroom, or for how long he’s been there. 

_ He’s dead. He’s dead. He’s dead.  _

_ You killed him.  _

Ash pulls at his hair, because if he doesn’t the thoughts will consume him. 

_ What the hell is wrong with him? _

He can’t help but dig his fingernails into his scalp. 

He can’t help but laugh. He doesn’t want to. 

But he can’t stop. 

Something is wrong with him. 

There’s always been something wrong with him. 

Dino was right. 

Ash is nothing but a screw up. 

_ God,  _ what has he gotten himself into?

He’s not even an adult and he’s already killed two men. 

_ Murderer.  _

_ Heartless. Ruthless. Devil.  _

Someone is knocking at the door. “...Ash?”

It’s muffled. 

“Ash?” 

“Ash.”

“Ash!”

Ash pulls his head up from where it was resting. 

He looks out the window next to him and sees houses passing by. 

_ What? _

_ Where is he? _

“What the hell was  _ that _ ?” Somebody says,

Ash looks over.  _ Max.  _ Why is he with Max?

Ash doesn’t say anything, he doesn’t know  _ what  _ to say. 

“You’re lucky Mr. Crosby didn’t press charges,” he shakes his head, disappointed, “or you’d be on your way to jail right now.”

_ Marvin’s alive?  _

_ Marvin’s alive!  _

Ash’s gut sinks into his stomach. 

Marvin’s alive. 

_ He’s gonna kill me.  _

Max. 

_ Max is here.  _

Is he speaking?

“Ash?” He asks again, turning his blinker on, “are you listening to me?”

Ash just sits up slowly, his head throbbing at the motion. 

“Why’d you push that guy down the stairs?” Max asks, loud enough Ash involuntarily winces. He doesn’t notice, but turns to Ash after a moment, eyebrows all strewn together, “it isn’t like you.”

Ash runs at his temples, “you don’t even know me.”

“Well I know you wouldn’t do something like this.” 

_ Ash doesn’t get it anymore. And he’s sick and tired of trying to wrap his head around what a bunch of idiots think.  _

“And how would you know that?” He snaps. Still looking down. 

“I don’t know,” Max says back a little louder, “call it an intuition.”

“Screw your intuition.” Ash says, “what did you expect from a punk like me?”

“What I  _ expect _ is for a grown ass teenager not to push people down staircases.”

The silence that follows is thick. 

_ Ha.  _

Oh the foul things Ash could compare the thickness to. 

“I know you, Ash—” Max starts,

“You don’t know zip about me!” Ash snaps, sitting up just a little bit straighter. 

“Yeah, okay fine!” Max snaps back, “but only because you won’t let me know—“ he does finger quotes, “—‘zip’ about you.”

“Cause I don’t want you to know me!” He drops his head to the side, letting it rest on the window, cursing. “I don’t want to screw up your ‘perfect little life’!” 

Max doesn’t say anything for a moment, pulling up to the house, putting the car in park, “Ash.”

Ash doesn’t look away from the window, eyes glued to something outside.

“Ash,” he says again, gently, “I need you to look at me.” 

Ash drags his eyes from the window, but keeps himself drawn as close to the door as possible. 

Max has the audacity to look unthreatening. 

“You’re a good kid, Ash.”

He says it so  _ confidently _ , and looking into his eyes, Ash can’t find even a hint that he’s lying.

But it isn’t true— it  _ can’t be.  _

Ash shrinks in his seat. Looking away, he laughs, “I’m not.”

Max turns to him fully, screwing his eyebrows together, “why?”

Ash opens his mouth to say something, 

_ Because I'm worthless.  _

_ I’m a waste of space.  _

_ I’m a slut, a whore.  _

_ Because you shouldn’t have brought me into your house.  _

Ash doesn’t say anything out loud.

Just panics.

He fumbles with his seat belt.

Opening the car door, Ash gets out and walks. 

_ Dino was right. _

He hears Max get out behind him, “woah, Ash!” He calls, “we aren’t done talking about this.”

_ I can’t do this. I can’t do this.  _

He reaches for the front door,  _ it’s unlocked.  _

“Ash, buddy! Slow down.”

He swings the door open. And for a moment all he can do is stand there. 

_ What was I doing? What  _ am  _ I doing? _

_ Think damnit. Why can’t you do anything right? _

His backpack’s up the stairs. If he can grab it he can come back down, leave, they’ll be happy to have him out of their hair—

“Ash?” Max huffs, confused, “this conversation isn’t over.”

But Ash isn’t thinking. There’s a voice behind him, too close for comfort. 

It’s the steps again. 

He’s running this time.

“Ash!” A hand comes down and grips his shoulder. He yanks himself away.

“ _ Don’t. _ ” He grits, unable to keep his voice even, “don’t touch me.”

He turns back around,  _ just get up the stairs. Just get away. Then you can think.  _

_ Frick. It’s not Marvin. Max is not Marvin.  _

Max is not—

“You can’t just—”

Max reaches out again, and a hand wraps around Ash’s upper arm. 

Ash twists, so violently he falls backwards on the steps. 

_ Frick. Frick. Frick. _

Max isn’t Marvin. 

But there’s a shadow,

“—Ash?”

_ Frick. Frick. Frick. _

He can’t breathe.  _ Just get a grip. Just get a— _

_ Dino’s in a coma. Dino’s in a coma. Dino’s— _

_ A hand gently brushes against the back of his,  _

And he can’t get the thought of Marvin out of his head. 

He flinches,  _ like the frail child he is—always has been.  _

_ Oh god, he can’t do this.  _

He backs away. 

Can’t catch his feet. 

He runs away. 

Cause besides sucking dick, that’s all he’ll ever be good at. 

The door slamming rings in his ears. 

Cause if he can focus on that, maybe he’ll forget the feeling of hands running across his body. Maybe he’ll forget the stench of burnt skin. 

Maybe he won’t notice the wetness building in his eyes. 

_ Dino was right.  _

He was always such a damn baby. 

...

Max knocks at his door minutes later. Knuckles gently rapping on the stained wood. 

“Ash—”

“—Just go away.”

“I’m—”  _ sorry _ . Max doesn’t get to say. 

Ash almost sounds pained. 

“... _ please. _ ”

His hand is outstretched, if he could open it? Knock again maybe?

He’s confused. So utterly confused. 

But he knows better. 

Max doesn’t reach out again. 

… 

Ash doesn’t remember falling asleep. 

Or— passing out rather. 

It’s pitch black outside.

His eyes feel crusty. 

His stomach is screwed up. 

To sum up, he feels like crap. But that’s nothing new. 

He’s hiding out in (his? Frick this is getting confusing) room like the child that he is. 

Looks like he left his backpack at the school. So now all his plans are ruined. 

See, he was thinking of just climbing out the window, catching a bus, living on the streets until Dino wakes up or he finds himself dead in some alleyway. 

_ But without it? _

Ash wouldn’t last a week. 

( _ Like he’d be so opposed to that. _ )

The point is, he’s not running away. Not today at least. 

_ Damnit _ . 

Standing at the top of the stairs, it takes him a minute or so before he has the courage to walk down. 

Better they kick him out anyways.

He hears them in the kitchen, so he walks over, standing in the doorway. They don’t notice him at first. 

“I don’t know what to think, Max—”

“What is there to think about?”

“Everything! Nothing! I dunno!” A pause, “he almost killed a guy, what are we supposed to think about that?”

“He broke his arm—”

“He was  _ unconscious. _ ”

“That’s not the point—”

“I’m done talking about this.”

“Jess—”

“No. No good is going to come from arguing!”

“Jess—”

“I said I’m—”

“No.” he turns her around, “look.”

Jessica looks where he points, confused for a moment, before she spots Ash, her face softens. 

“Hey, buddy.” She clears her throat, “sorry about that… I thought you were asleep.”

_ Why are you apologizing to me? _

_ I’m the screw up. I’m the one who got you guys in trouble. _

Ash shrugs, “I’m not.”

The room is quiet then, as they all look at each other. Except Ash who’s staring a hole through the floor. 

There’s a pause, as Max pulls out a stool to sit down on. He sighs, “I know you don’t want to,” he starts, “but we really need to address what the hell happened back there.” He gestures for Ash to sit too. 

Ash stays where he is. 

“What is there to discuss?” Ash can’t help but raise his voice, “I pushed a guy  _ down the stairs _ .”

“Not that.”

Ash tenses, “then…  _ what _ ?”

Max doesn’t look away, “what happened back there in the car—on the staircase.”

“I— I don’t—” Ash feels at a loss for words again. 

After a moment, Max seems to rethink what he said. 

“You don’t—  _ have  _ to talk about it but just— we just want you to know we’re  _ here _ for you.”

Ash can’t look Max in the eyes, glancing at Jessica she seems like she wants to butt in, but thinks better of it at the last moment. 

They remain silent. 

“Aren’t you—?” Ash starts after a minute, “aren’t you guys going to like—”  _ hurt  _ “—ground me for hurting someone?”

“ _ Technically yes _ , but we’ve come to the agreement that we’re not gonna jump to any conclusions until we know  _ why _ . Especially since the misunderstanding last time” 

“—but it makes no difference does it?” He chuckles, “I broke his arm, didn’t I?”

Max runs a hand through his hair, “there’s a difference between first degree murder and third degree murder, kid.”

His stomach drops, and yet his gut fills with relief, “ _ I thought I didn’t kill him _ .”

“You didn’t.” He sighs, “I’m just— I’m trying to make a point… just—  _ intention _ matters.”

_ Like hell.  _

“—who was that guy anyways?” Jessica asks out of the blue, sitting down next to Max, “was he a teacher?”

“No… he was Uhh—” Ash doesn’t know quite what to say. He coughs, “He’s not a teacher.”

“Then why was he in the school?” She asks,

_ A handjob?  _ Ash’s mind can’t help but pipe up, although he’s sure she wouldn’t appreciate the crudeness. 

“I don’t know.”

“Is he somebody’s parent?”

_ No. But every creep’s got some sort of kink.  _

“I don’t know.”

“Do you know him?”

Ash hesitates, “no.”

_ Next up: the million dollar question. _

“Then— why’d you push him down the stairs?”

Ash leans forward ever so slightly, “I don’t  _ have _ a reason—”

“—bullshit.” Max interrupts. Jessica smacks him, 

“ _ Max! _ ”

“No!” He justifies, “It is! And I’m not gonna sit here and pretend that Ash is just some punk!”

“ _ Why _ ?” Ash says over him, exasperated, “I know you’ll just  _ kick me out _ eventually.”

“—kick you out?” Jessica interrupts, “woah there kid, we’re not going to kick you out.”

_ It’s so frustrating. _

“What the hell is  _ wrong _ with you?” He spits, “I push a guy down the stairs and you’re just—  _ fine with it _ ?”

“Woah, woah.” Max puts his hands out, “we didn’t say that.”

“Well it sure as hell seems like you did—!”

“—okay,  _ okay _ , let’s start over!” Jessica yells, “One:  _ Ash _ ,—” she points to the teen,”you are one- _ hundred- _ percent grounded. Two:—” she puts up two fingers, “I don’t know if you have a  _ reason _ or not, but it’d be _ really damn  _ helpful for you to  _ defend _ yourself for once—” she holds up a third finger, “I know this whole situation is  _ dumb _ , but thanks to my friend Charlie, we’ll find out what your punishment for physical assault is  _ tomorrow _ . We’re all tired. So if we  _ all _ could just go to sleep, that would be  _ greatly _ appreciated.” Jessica smiles almost threateningly, gives Max a kiss on the cheek, and walks out of the room. 

Ash looks to Max as he’s dropping his head in his hands. He’s quiet for a minute, then he sits up, looks at Ash, “she’s right. It’s almost midnight. We should go to bed.”

Ash nods, goes up the stairs. 

He thought they were just weirdos. 

_ But these people are psychopaths.  _

Ash doesn’t sleep a wink. 

He’s not tired anyways. 

… 

The punishment, as it turns out, is that Ash has to go to therapy. Because despite what Max says, Ash  _ is  _ prone to a history of violence. 

And apparently the only way to fix that is to sit in a room and talk about his  _ feelings _ .

_ Like that’s gonna change anything.  _

Not to mention the unlikelihood that Ash’ll live past eighteen. No point in trying to fix what’s already broken. 

Because  _ despite _ all the slip ups this past week, Ash is pretty good at keeping his crap under wraps. 

_ Shrinks only do it for the money anyways.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh boy, I’m not too happy with this chapter. But I’ve read it over and over and I genuinely just don’t know where to start XD
> 
> +and yeah, therapy! (This isn’t gonna be inaccurate at all! (-_-;) )
> 
> +I don’t know if I’ll ever get around to explaining it in the actual fic, but the reason Marvin didn’t press charges, is because he’s scared of Dino waking up, and he knows if he puts Dino’s ‘prized possession’ in jail, and Dino finds out about it, Marvin would be in some deep crap. Aka: Marvin’s a little chicken. 
> 
> +it’s honestly so crazy (in a good way) looking at this and going “I’m not even half finished.” 
> 
> F

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I'd really appreciate feedback, this is my first fan-fiction and yes I know it is horrible... So comment! If only to roast me! Just remember, hatred fuels me  
> o(^-^)o
> 
> Thank you to everyone for the massive support! I don’t think I would have even a fraction of the same motivation that I do without it. So genuinely, all of you are angels, and I’m glad you enjoy this :)


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